Vietnam Airlines cancelled flight

rorylando45

Hi all,

On 31/12/2015 I booked some flights to Vietnam for my partner and I. The itinerary was this:

Thurs 17 Mar: Heathrow - Hanoi (Vietnam Airlines)
Mon 28 Mar: Saigon - Heathrow (Vietnam Airlines)

The flights were booked on https://www.travelup.co.uk, and our eTickets came through very soon after booking - so far, so good.

However, just this morning, I've had an email through from Travelup as follows:

Subject: Flight Schedule Change Ref : xxxxxx
MAR 03, 2016 | 11:37AM GMT
Dimple replied:
Dear xxxxxx,

Thank you for booking with us. We are sorry to have to write to you with details of a change to your booking. Airline schedules are planned many months in advance and the flight information in our reservation systems and on our website is accurate at the time of reservation. However, occasionally flight times do change to meet the scheduling requirements of the airports and airlines booked and we take all reasonable steps to ensure that any schedule change information is conveyed to our valuable clients as soon as possible. This is in line with our terms and conditions.
It is with regret that on this occasion the flights on which you were travelling on has been affected by a schedule change.
The new and revised details are as follows:


Passengers Names:

1.xxxxxx/xxxxxx MISS(ADT/xxxxxx)
2.xxxxxx/xxxxxx MR(ADT/xxxxxx)

Flights schedule

VN 051 31MAR SGN-LHR 0050 0740

Please check all details to ensure these are satisfactory as this may have a major impact on other travel plans that have been made. Please ensure that any hotels, transfer or tour bookings etc. booked elsewhere are amended in accordance with the new flight details and any such arrangements booked directly with us will be amended accordingly.

Please reply to this email as a confirmation of acceptance the revised schedule change.

Note : We will not be able to reissue your e-tickets until we receive the confirmation email from you.

Schedule changes may occur once flights depart the UK, and it is recommended that you check the details of onward or return flights, either online at https://www.mytripandmore.com or https://www.checkmytrip.com and follow the onscreen instructions.

Reconfirming All Flights
You must telephone us or the airline at least 72 hours before the departure time shown on your e-ticket. Reconfirming your flight at least 72 hours before departure is a minimum requirement.


Please note we are unable to offer any monetary gestures towards out of pocket expenses if you have a booking with us and no compensation will be offered on schedule changes as covered in the Terms and Conditions of carriage.

Please accept our sincere apologies on behalf of the airline for any inconvenience this may have caused.

If you have any query, Please feel free to contact me.

Yours Sincerely,

Dimple Edwin
Admin Officer
Schedule Change Department

So from what I gather, our flight back on Mon 28 Mar has been cancelled and they are moving us onto another one on Thurs 31 Mar.

If my partner and I were still students, this would be great news (3 days extra holiday!) - sadly however, that is not the case, and we are both working full-time now. She needs to give 8 weeks notice for holiday request, so it would not be possible to get the additional 3 days approved at such short notice.

Below are some of the questions swimming through my head at the moment:

- I'm not clear at this stage whether Vietnam Airlines have actually cancelled the flight themselves, or whether Travelup are just trying to move us around. I put my itinerary details on https://www.checkmytrip.com and got this message:

9115 - Please note that the Airline has cancelled one or more of your selected flights. Please modify your reservation, or contact your travel agent for further information. (9115)

So I guess that seems fairly conclusive that the flight on Mon 28 Mar is not running?

- How much leverage do we have here in requesting to be put on some other route home on Mon 28 Mar? There are no direct routes that day it seems but there are a number of indirect routes we could take

- Would we need to take this up with Vietnam Airlines, or with Travelup? If Vietnam Airlines really did cancel the flight then it's not really Travelup's fault, not sure whether they still hold some liability though?

- I have an annual travel insurance policy with Virgin, however, I'm just checking the dates now and my current policy runs from 25 March 2015 to 24 March 2016. So basically it elapses slap bang in the middle of our booked holiday. I imagine since the cancelled flight is after the end date, it wouldn't be covered? If I were to renew the policy now for another year, would it be covered under that? I'm guessing not.

Basically I'm just at a loss as to where to go from here. I've never been in this situation before, I suppose the easiest thing to do would be to just book some one-way indirect flights back from Saigon to London for Mon 28 Mar but that's coming out at about £320 per person now, which I really don't have to spare

Any help or advice would be hugely appreciated!

Ames

I can't help with most of your questions, but your current insurance should cover this - it's when the problem arises that counts, not when it'd be happening. In fact, I wouldn't expect it to be covered under the new policy if you renew your insurance because it would be a known problem.

richardw

VN fly from SGN to Frankfurt and Paris as well, so if you don't mind an indirect routing home, find an alternative on VN's website also look at expedia for flights with VN flight numbers operated by other airlines including air france and then call TravelUp and say that's what you want. Don't e mail, best to sort it out on the phone and then get a confirmation.

Flying SGN-HAN-LHR might also be an option.

Vietnam's a great place to go, so don't cancel, you'd regret it.

agrinnall

It does look like the SGN-LHR flight on the 28th no longer exists. There is a HAN-LHR flight that day (00:05 - 10:30 via CDG), could you get an evening flight back from HCMC to Hanoi on the 27th? I did that flight when I was in Vietnam, booked a couple of days before I flew, and asI recall it was quite cheap.

rorylando45

Ames wrote: »

I can't help with most of your questions, but your current insurance should cover this - it's when the problem arises that counts, not when it'd be happening. In fact, I wouldn't expect it to be covered under the new policy if you renew your insurance because it would be a known problem.

Thank you for this information. I might look through the policy wording of my policy then - I'm not sure whether we could both be covered, or just me.

richardw wrote: »

VN fly from SGN to Frankfurt and Paris as well, so if you don't mind an indirect routing home, find an alternative on VN's website and then call TravelUp and say that's what you want. Don't e mail, best to sort it out on the phone and then get a confirmation.

Flying SGN-HAN-LHR might also be an option.

Vietnam's a great place to go, so don't cancel, you'd regret it.

Thank you. Sadly there are no flights to Frankfurt 26, 27, 28 or 29. However there is one to Paris on Sunday 27th, which wouldn't be the end of the world, although we would lose one day of our holiday

PeacefulWaters

rorylando45 wrote: »

Thank you for this information. I might look through the policy wording of my policy then - I'm not sure whether we could both be covered, or just me.



Thank you. Sadly there are no flights to Frankfurt 26, 27, 28 or 29. However there is one to Paris on Sunday 27th, which wouldn't be the end of the world, although we would lose one day of our holiday

Or gain an evening in Paris. There are worse things!

richardw

Look at Tuesday 29th arrivals to LON.

littlereddevil

I don't think you would need to use your insurance as the airline has to give your money back if you don't want that flight

Voyager2002

littlereddevil wrote: »

I don't think you would need to use your insurance as the airline has to give your money back if you don't want that flight

Maybe, maybe not. Since this is not an EU airline the rights under EU law do not apply here.

slinga

We've been flying Vietnam Airlines Changi> LHR since last year as the BC is great value.

Last year they gave an arrival time in LHR of 6-40am which actually arrived at 7-40am due to Vietnam Airlines not accounting for the change to BST.

We had a bit of a panic changing our National Express coach at when Rriving at LHR but managed it.
This year we were also looking to book the March 28 flight which earlier this year looked a possibility.
Luckily for us we decided to spend some time in HCMC so will take a flight in April, hopefully.

Vietnam Airlines seem not to have got all their ducks in a row at present.

I hope it does work out for you somehow.

rorylando45

Still struggling to get this sorted, we asked to be put onto the HAN-CDG-LHR route on Mon 28 March. The Travelup woman phoned Vietnam Airlines and was told there were no Economy seats left on that route. And right enough, if you search for that route on the Vietnam Airlines website, only Business Class shows up as still available.

Strangely enough if you search for it on other websites (e.g. the AirFrance website), the Economy class does show up as available, so I've told the Travelup woman to go back to Vietnam Airlines and ask them about that.

If there's no way we can do that, we're going to have to come back overnight on the Saturday I think which will be a real pain. I'll update here if/when it gets resolved in case anyone is interested!