Netflights - not booked flight despite taking payment.

johnandmaz

We are 2 families of 4 travelling in August. We both booked identical Virgin PE flights last September via Netflights and paid via credit card. It was a Delta codeshare but Virgin flight. We were sat next to each other when booking on different laptops but were seperate bookings. Receipts were sent and payment taken. As it was an indulgence after leaving the military after 30 years in the RAF, he had paid £4180 for 4 adult tickets.

Went on to book the accomodation etc after booking via other companies to tie in with the flight dates. I logged onto Virgin a few months back and used the Netflights reference and it came up.

My friend tried to do the same using his Netflights reference number and it wouldn't accept. He rang Virgin the other day and they have no record of any booking. He checked our name and we are booked on but not his family. They are not on the plane. The VA rep was very understanding but just didn't have his name.

He rang Netflights and they are baffled. they say that the booking must have got lost in the electronic ether between Netflights and Virgin. They are stumped. They are ringing him back on Monday. My friend said they didn't sound too positive about getting it sorted. There is seat availability on the flight, although the price has risen dramatically. Surely Netflights should book these seats at no extra cost?

Has anyone had anything like this happen and what are the options? Tried googling this situation but it must be pretty rare as I had no hits.

richardw

My guess is there weren't enough DL codeshare seats left at that price and the system should have issued a 'not available' response but didn't.

johnandmaz

richardw wrote: »

My guess is there weren't enough DL codeshare seats left at that price and the system should have issued a 'not available' response but didn't.

Netflights (quite ridiculous) initial response was that becuase we had booked the same flight within a few minutes of each other, it caused a glitch in the system.

They received a booking confirmation and payment was taken immediately. Bearing in mind this was last September. It was only through the fact that my friend went to set up the flight (as I had) on the Virgin website ready to reserve seats at the 60 day point that this was spotted. He might not have actually found out until just before leaving. :mad:

I mean - what are the possible options here?

jpsartre

Obviously they need to complete the booking or issue a full refund. A decent agency would do the former, even if it put them out of pocket. These situations are why a lot of people recommend that you book tickets direct from the airline and that you check your booking regularly (which your friend fortunately did).

richardw

In the early days of the VS/DL codeshare I have my doubts that both airlines' systems were infallible, having made a booking and seen things in action.

johnandmaz

Appreciate the replies. :T

Agree with the book direct- we have used Virgin many times and always booked direct but this was £200 per person cheaper for the same flight.

Until they ring back and tell them what they have found out, we won't know what happened. Having said that, I don't think the codeshare system was a major cause of the problem. Our booking went through without a hitch. It seems that someone just accepted their booking and payment but never reserved seats.

If they just refund the money (can they do just that??) it would be a disaster. We have gone halves on accomodation with us, even a few other things like airport transfers on those dates. It would cost us both a fortune. They/we would have to take further action to force them to book the seats - even at the heightened prices.

What are our options though? Fully prepared to go down the route of media pressure - watchdog , Twitter, Facebook, consumer sites etc and We would go down the route of legal action if possible. But these are medium to long term results - all they want is the holiday they had planned, paid and looked forward to.

After comments on this forum and a few others, I feel pretty sure a company like Netflights will sort out the bookings but we're just planning for plan B. Any ideas anyone?

richardw

Do you know when your itinerary was ticketed?

johnandmaz

richardw wrote: »

Do you know when your itinerary was ticketed?

Hi Richard. Not sure what you mean. Do you mean the date the booking confirmation was sent?

richardw

No, when each passenger was given a ticket number. If you put your details in delta.com and go into your booking it might show on the booking somewhere.

johnandmaz

richardw wrote: »

No, when each passenger was given a ticket number. If you put your details in delta.com and go into your booking it might show on the booking somewhere.

Ah. Well we got our e-ticket a few days after our booking confirmation. Our friends didn't. Although we only just realised that. They didn't realise that they were being sent it so why would they miss it.

I logged on delta and entered the reference and it appeared on virgin website at the same time (being a code share) which is pretty good. All this happened last October after booking. My friend recently tried the same but it didn't recognise the reference which caused him to ring Virgin and discover the current situation

richardw

My guess is net flights didn't ticket your friends itinerary and they may try to blame DL.