Flight altered without our knowledge,nowhere to stay! help!

phebe3

(i originally posted on wrong board and have moved post)
:mad:



Hi, we have booked to go to Turkey in 3 weeks, booked it in april and are flying out with aegean air,who when contacted appear to be holidays 4u..anyone know if they have taken over Aegean Air? address http://www.aegeanflights.com
They have changed our flight time so much (by around 8 hours at least) I now have to pay an extra £20 for car parking at the airport, a amendment fee to the taxi transfer company in Turkey and am waiting to find if we have to pay extra for our villa..that's even supposing we can get into our villa and someone else isn't in it as we now arrive on 6 Aug in Turkey and not 7 Aug. We never received any communication regarding this change although they said they sent us an e mail.

We were originally flying from Manchester at 7pm on Fri 6 Aug and arriving in Bodrum on Sat 7 aug at 12.30am. I booked the car parking at Manchester and the transfer from Bodrum and our villa accordingly. I have just found out, purely by chance cos I went on line to fill in something for Aegean air, that we have been put on a flight (different flight number)going at 9 am in the morning of 6 Aug and arriving at 1 pm on 6 August. Aegean Air didn't tell us of this change and when I phoned up their 10p a minute phone line said it was cos the night flight didn't exist anymore so they put us on this one. After some negotiation Aegean agreed we could go on the 11am flight as we wd find it v difficult to get to Manchester for 7am..which was WHY I'd booked the late 7pm flight in the first place!
Can I claim anything off them..the flight we are booked onto is £250 cheaper than our original one anyway and at least it would cover the extra cost of parking, transfer and most of all villa hire for an extra day. As it is, they appear to be keeping the £250 difference..my money! Our travel ins doesn't seem to cover this either cos it is re-scheduling not cancellation. In the small print ther is a little about compensation, but it has to be within short time of going..and they say they e-mailed us in April..but I never got it. I have asked for evidence of the e-mail but feel it is our word against theirs.
Have to say I have been booking flights abroad and villas separately for years and this is the first time this has happened. I don't think I'll be booking through Aegena again, or H4u at moment

alanrowell

First bit of advice - take some deep breaths and rewrite this when you are calmer. As it stands it's virtualy unreadable

melb

As someone suggested on the other thread you would presumably have booked your villa for the 6th August as your first night anyway as you wouldn't have wanted to arrive at 12.30 am ie middle of the night and wanted to wait until the afternoon to get into your accommodation. So I don't understand how you will need to book another night's stay?

jamesbrownontheroad

phebe3 wrote: »

Hi, we have booked to go to Turkey in 3 weeks, booked it in april and are flying out with aegean air,who when contacted appear to be holidays 4u..anyone know if they have taken over Aegean Air? address http://www.aegeanflights.com

No. Aegean Airlines is an airline, Holidays4u is a travel agent. Aegean Airlines website is not that one, it's http://www.aegeanair.com/ It simply looks like you've booked your flights through a travel agent.

phebe3

I see. Re the villa, the owner did say we may have to pay another day cos he booked us in from 7 Aug, not Friday 6 Aug. Sorry to rant...deep breath taken..just never had this happen before and did hack me off a little to say the least, particularly cos we weren't told about it at the time. Asked H4U and they say Aegean, who we booked with, are their sister company. Suppose will just have to swallow the extra cost of car parking etc ...and travel by ferry next year if we go abroad. That'll teach me to go somewhere different to our usual holidays............

peachyprice

phebe3 wrote: »

I see. Re the villa, the owner did say we may have to pay another day cos he booked us in from 7 Aug, not Friday 6 Aug. .

So what were you originally going to do when you left the airport at 1.30am until you could get into the apartment at the 2-3 pm check in time? Or had you not taken that into account when you booked?

phebe3

Umm..did someone get out of bed the wrong side this morning or have I read your reply in the wrong tone peachy?! Beleive me, I am VERY careful when I book a holiday...we were allowed to go into the apartment..it's a villa actually as I said before, as the owner had booked it for us from SATURDAY 7TH AUG...when we originally were arriving. I have been booking holidays independantly for years and I suppose we were lucky in that we have never not been notified of delays this big..in fact we've never not been notified...which was my main bone of contention really. Obviously e-mails form companies aren't as reliable as we sometimes think. All sorted now, just coughed up a lot extra money cos had no choice ..car parking, taxi , alteration to arrangements costs etc.

peterbaker

Hi phebe.
Sorry to hear about your plans being altered at the last minute, and your pocket being affected too.
We were discussing on another thread how these small to medium Mediterranean package operators seem to be a rather incestuous bunch, so I wouldn't be surprised if your flight change was caused by a knock-on effect of the Goldtrail collapse.

I discovered yesterday with a bit of Googling that for five years until February 2010, the Sales and Marketing Director at Holidays 4U was actually Sales and Marketing Manager at Goldtrail: http://uk.linkedin.com/pub/joe-lavers/3/b1a/1a9 . He was quoted as offering to sell replacement packages to Goldtrail customers.

You might venture to write to him and ask him how the last minute change you reported was fair to you, whether your original flight was shared with Goldtrail, whether it has been cancelled because of Goldtrail, whether you have been bumped off your original flight by higher paying customers e.g. rebookers from Goldtrail, and what he knows about the whole sorry business. Oh and of course whether he might seek to recompense you for your additional costs.

While you wait for his reply (and based on one or two others of his letters to be found posted on the internet by complaining package customers over the years), don't hold your breath, and do have a really good holiday

flea72

phebe3 wrote: »

Umm..did someone get out of bed the wrong side this morning or have I read your reply in the wrong tone peachy?! Beleive me, I am VERY careful when I book a holiday...we were allowed to go into the apartment..it's a villa actually as I said before, as the owner had booked it for us from SATURDAY 7TH AUG...when we originally were arriving. I have been booking holidays independantly for years and I suppose we were lucky in that we have never not been notified of delays this big..in fact we've never not been notified...which was my main bone of contention really. Obviously e-mails form companies aren't as reliable as we sometimes think. All sorted now, just coughed up a lot extra money cos had no choice ..car parking, taxi , alteration to arrangements costs etc.

yes, the owner said you could have the property from saturday 7th, but as what time of day?

villas/rooms usually have a checkin time of mid afternoon. so if you arrived at the villa at 1am on the 7th, you wouldnt have access to the villa, for another 14hrs, unless you booked the room for overnight of the 6th, so this is why the owner is now saying you will have to pay for another day

also cant see how carparking has increased, as they charge per day not per 24hrs, and you are leaving on the same day and returning on the same day as originally planned, so the car will be in the carpark for the same amount of time

F

peachyprice

phebe3 wrote: »

Umm..did someone get out of bed the wrong side this morning or have I read your reply in the wrong tone peachy?! Beleive me, I am VERY careful when I book a holiday...we were allowed to go into the apartment..it's a villa actually as I said before, as the owner had booked it for us from SATURDAY 7TH AUG...when we originally were arriving. I have been booking holidays independantly for years and I suppose we were lucky in that we have never not been notified of delays this big..in fact we've never not been notified...which was my main bone of contention really. Obviously e-mails form companies aren't as reliable as we sometimes think. All sorted now, just coughed up a lot extra money cos had no choice ..car parking, taxi , alteration to arrangements costs etc.

No I didn't get out of bed the wrong side, and yes, you did read it in the wrong tone.

It was a genuine question.

If the villa was going to be ready for you at 1.30am on Saturday, it will be ready for you at 2pm on Friday. The owner isn't going to kick someone out on Friday night so you can get in in the early hours of Saturday. If the owner is saying you have to pay for another night, he's trying to rip you off.

If you had no intention of going to the villa before Saturday afternoon, which seems they case from your reply as the villa is only booked from Saturday and you hadn't taken the early arrival time into account, the owner is correct in asking you to pay for another night.

See, I was asking you a question to HELP you, no need to be quite to touchy next time.