Lowcostholidays collapses – your rights as 140,000 hit by travel chaos

hugo15

richardw wrote: »

Does the Expedia website recognise your hotel booking?

No. Spoke to the UK business contact centre and no joy. Swapping e-mails with the US contact centre now but the computer is currently still saying no. Will keep trying.

Westin

JJB1979 wrote: »

I am set to leave in less than a week.

Flights are okay, I think. Transfers have been cancelled and I need to rebook.

My hotel booking says non-refundable. I called the hotel and they said my booking is still in place (but I guess they may be unaware of what has happened yet). I asked if it had all been paid and the guy on reception said yes. Often non-refundable is because it's paid in advance (I remember the option of paying more for refundable, but I went for the cheaper non-refundable). Could it be that my hotel is paid for even if it goes against what the administrators are saying?

I unfortunately paid by debit card. Anyone here had experience with chargeback and if it works easily?

I fear that it won't be immediately clear even to hotels if the LowCost bookings have been prepaid or not.

With many upcoming bookings, LowCost will have supplied hoteliers with a virtual credit card for payment for those bookings they themselves made under their own contract agreements. Payment can only be drawn on the VCC at a pre agreed time either just prior to guest arrival, at check-in of guest, or after departure. Hotels may have such VCC details attached to reservations and therefore believe the reservation is paid, but may find that the VCC rejects when they attempt to draw payment.

It will likely only be early next week before hoteliers establish what is happening and agree a payment policy. I would however think that most will be asked to pay again for their hotel stay.

Westin

If you are travelling to Spain and Portugal in particular it is vital to contact the hotelier immediately as there is a serious overbooking issue and they would be delighted to resell the rooms if you don't tell them you still want to stay.

Very wise words from Alan.

This issue with LowCost will be the perfect get-out for many Spanish or Portugese hotelier who has an overbooking problem looming during high season.

betterdaysahead

hugo15 wrote: »

Spoke to Thomas Cook who we are flying with and they confirmed the flights were paid for :-)

Phoned the hotel and they confirmed our booking and said it had been pre-paid. Just noticed on the hotel booking that Low Cost Holidays booked it via Lowcost Beds with Expedia with a Travelscape LLP booking reference. Hopefully it will be OK. Have e-mailed the hotel too as I would like something in writing. If I don't get a response I'll probably ring again on Monday to double check.

Hi,
I'm in the same boat as you. I've just checked my small-print and it says:
Lowcostholidays Spain, S.L.U. is acting in its capacity as a retail agent for Lowcostbeds.com AG, who have made your booking with Hotels4U for booking ref Hotels4U 6170708___14.

My only hope is that Lowcostholidays may have paid Hotels4U immediately, who in turn would have paid the hotel. Or am I just being optimistic?

sharp910sh

I called the hotel and they said the booking as made by hotels4u which is a Thomas cook company. They said that payment hadn't been received but they will usually send out the invoice later. Not before. So I'm not sure. I hope.

leylandsunaddict

Presumably you've all read the LCG announcement on their website, that the writer of the MSE article for some reason didn't deem necessary to include?

http://www.lowcosttravelgroup.com

JJB1979

Westin wrote: »

I fear that it won't be immediately clear even to hotels if the LowCost bookings have been prepaid or not.

With many upcoming bookings, LowCost will have supplied hoteliers with a virtual credit card for payment for those bookings they themselves made under their own contract agreements. Payment can only be drawn on the VCC at a pre agreed time either just prior to guest arrival, at check-in of guest, or after departure. Hotels may have such VCC details attached to reservations and therefore believe the reservation is paid, but may find that the VCC rejects when they attempt to draw payment.

It will likely only be early next week before hoteliers establish what is happening and agree a payment policy. I would however think that most will be asked to pay again for their hotel stay.

Thanks for your response. This is not good...

The hotel cost £1,300, but with change in Euro to pound that is probably £1,600 now. More worrying is that checking on the hotel website gives a price of £2,600!!

If they are decent they will only expect me to pay what they had agreed with LCH. If they decide to profiteer when I'm already out there....

lea2012

We travel in just over a week and have a hotel only booking with travel Republic who booked our hotel with low cost beds.

Travel Republic are looking into it now and are going to try and rebook our hotel but I'm concerned that the occupancy levels are so high the hotel might not accept a rebook and I've searched lots of other websites and can't find any other accom at all on the island so not sure what will happen yet.

richardw

Westin wrote: »

.....With many upcoming bookings, LowCost will have supplied hoteliers with a virtual credit card for payment for those bookings they themselves made under their own contract agreements. Payment can only be drawn on the VCC at a pre agreed time either just prior to guest arrival, at check-in of guest, or after departure. Hotels may have such VCC details attached to reservations and therefore believe the reservation is paid, but may find that the VCC rejects when they attempt to draw payment..

Thanks, interesting to see how the payments are supposed to work.

TonyM19

Traveling with them on 25 August. All my flight details seem to be ok on the relevant flight companies websites (Monarch and Jet2). Going to call them later today to absolutely confirm.

Is the general advice to wait until Monday to call the hotel that I've booked?

I've used LCH about 10 times over the last 5/6 years and always booked with debit cards. I suppose I knew the risks I was taking. Anybody tried Visa Debit to use Chargeback yet?

If my flights are ok and I have to book alternative accommodation (which I don't get back - most probable scenario?), I'll be about £500 down. I really feel for families with young kids going out who are in the same boat.