Flights and Distance Selling

shonatom

Why is booking flights on line not covered by distance selling regulations when it comes to a cooling off period and cancelling them?

richardw

Applies to all transport and may have something to do with the practicalities of the business, ie if I book a ticket for travel on Tuesday and the cooling off period is 7 days, the business loses out if I change my mind on Wednesday and they have to give me a refund.

HXDave

i might be wrong on this, but doesn't the cooling off period only apply if, in the first instance, they cold called you?

luci

No, the Distance Selling Regulations apply to anything bought on the internet, apart from travel. You can return the goods within 7 days for a full refund.

Caz3121

some airlines allow you to cancel an online booking if you call them within 24 hours

bcl999

Is it not because it's a service rather than an actual physical item? I thought the purpose of DSR was to allow you to inspect a (physical) item as you would do buying in a shop and not be at a disadvantage.

whatmichaelsays

The Distance Selling Act gives transport an exemption because there is no need to "inspect" the goods in person.

If you buy clothing for example, there are plenty of reasons why you might want to return the goods - they might not fit, the photo used might misrepresent the colour, the style might not suit - all things you wouldn't know until the goods arrived.

With transport, there is no need to do this. A flight from London Heathrow to Paris CDG or a train from Manchester to London is just that - there's no confusion, no misrepresentation, no reason for a consumer to find that the product doesn't suit that wasn't there at time of purchase.

You can also argue that flights are a "personalised" product (after all, the tickets have your name on). Customised or personalised products are also exempt from the DSA.