Flight change - right or wrong?

Cowboy73

Hi all,
I booked a ski package holiday with flights from Belfast to Zurich, I knew the flights were to be confirmed so I phoned the company and was told as far as they knew the flights were still on schedule. I am going to Livigno in Italy and the only reason I booked this holiday was the fact the transfer time from Zurich is half compared to flying to Brescia (where I flew to last year), six hours on a coach is no fun!.
Anyway, last week I received an email to say our flight had been changed to....BRESCIA! I was gutted so phoned them straight away only to be told it was due to operational problems and to make the transfer to the resort more efficient. Now, can anyone tell me how a six hour transfer is more efficient to a three hour transfer???
The second excuse was the tunnel from Switzerland to Livigno is closed on the return journey so is impassible. On further investigation I found that there is a timetable for the tunnel and on Saturdays, the day of my flights, the flow of traffic from Livigno to Switzerland is not operational on the times of our transfer but these times havent changed all year! So my question to them was why would their company list a flight that they obviously couldnt operate?? Their reply was they could change the flight at any time without any excuse!
I dont know where I stand but surely to advertise a flight that could never actually operate is false advertising and cheating the customer. I paid quite a hefty price for my holiday as I believed I was getting good flights, the same holiday is now a lot cheaper because they have changed the flights on their website to Brescia. I have been on another popular travel forum and eveyone has commented that if the flights had been listed as Brescia then they would not have booked either. As far as I know no flight has left from Belfast to Zurich but they continued to tell me that they had intended to use this flight but had to changed at the last minute for the said reasons, and again I asked them how they intended to use those flights when it was impossible to complete the return transfer to Zurich due to the tunnel being closed!!!
At that point I gave up asking questions because they cover themselves with small print and I wasnt getting any truthful answers. Sorry for the long winded report but it has really annoyed me that a company can just do what they want when they want and expect paying customers to take it and be happy. I feel they have mis-sold me a holiday and have not provided me with satisfactory/truthful answers.
Rant over.
Cheers.

Cowboy73

Hi Cityboy,
Flight is 29th January and I was notified on 7th January.
This is part of numerous emails sent from them-
We were advised at the end of December that as from 15 January the Inbound journey from Livigno to Zurich would not be possible for our Zurich flight due to the one way system.

On having this information reconfirmed by our Country Manager in Livigno, we in turn made alternative flight arrangements and contacted customers to advise of the change.

As I have already said though, the tunnel times are the same as last year so they knew these flights couldnt operate. My friend was notified of his change midway through December for his flight on the 2nd January!
Cheers.

apt

Who is the tour operator? What do their terms and conditions say about what is a major/significant change? Your friend's evidence could be useful in demonstrating that the company is not being honest when it says it was only informed in late December.

dzug1

Don't know the answer - but when are these tunnel works due to finish? They may be scheduled to have done so already and are overrunning. So the company may be rescheduling on a week by week basis.

Or it may be as you say - they are advertising what will not be fulfilled

Cowboy73

Hi Dzug1
There are no tunnel works, on Saturdays there are set times for single flow of traffic between Switzerland and Livigno and as far as I can see the times haven't changed since last year. BUT surely the operating times of the tunnel should have been the major factor in the whether the transfer to the resort could be completed hence determining whether a flight to Zurich could go ahead, phew!
They are saying they fully intended to operate a Zurich flight and that it has only just been a last minute decision to change to Brescia but my point is how did they intend to operate a flight that they couldn't provide transfers from the resort to?
The company is Directski and they stand by their terms and conditions that they can change any flight, airport etc at any time. I would fully understand if there was a genuine reason ie Over running roadworks, but to list a flight that hasn't actually taken off nor will is just wrong.
I fully believe they did it to get people booked as I know of a lot of folks who wouldn't have booked if they knew the flight was to Brescia, then they can change the flight to anywhere as it's in their T&C's that they can!