Can you reclaim a deposit for a holiday

emzuk69 · 25 March 2019 at 8:03PM

We have booked a holiday for next August but no flights or hotels have been booked as yet. We have not signed any contract. We paid £1200 deposit but have been told it’s non refundable. Can they keep all this money when nothing has been booked

davidmcn · 25 March 2019 at 8:09PM

If no flights or hotels have been booked...what has been booked? Who have you paid the money to?

mattyprice4004 · 25 March 2019 at 8:32PM

First things first, you've entered into a contract of some sort, or you wouldn't have handed any money over. Signature is irrelevant, and contracts don't have to be written.

If you're wanting to walk away with the whole deposit, what exactly do you think the deposit is for?
It was to guarantee a booking, so you can't expect them to hand it all back. They'll have done some leg-work even if they've not booked it yet - they could get a discount for buying 10 rooms from a bed-bank, but with your cancellation might have increased costs for the other 9.

Les79 · 25 March 2019 at 8:57PM

emzuk69 wrote: »

We have booked a holiday for next August but no flights or hotels have been booked as yet. We have not signed any contract. We paid £1200 deposit but have been told it’s non refundable. Can they keep all this money when nothing has been booked

If they are expected to lose out on money due to you cancelling then yes, they will likely be entitled to keep at least some of the deposit.

Why?

You have put the deposit down as a way of saying "yes, hold this holiday for me". Due to you now cancelling, they may have incurred a loss. Examples include:

- They have finished their advertising campaign and would need to restart it to re-advertise your holiday (which could have been a special sale price etc)

- They have turned away prospective customers who would otherwise have taken your slot and so have lost out on someone who would pay the full whack.

- Processing your deposit and request for holiday.

- They have formed contracts with flight companies/hotels and now have to renege on them. Or they have lost out on special package prices (as per mattyprice's post).

You MAY be entitled to some of it back, however if the company don't willingly fork it over you're in for a path of hassle. Letter before action, followed by Small Claims Court. The upside is that it's fairly cheap to initiate, the downside is WHO KNOWS what you'd get back?!

Another option would be to request a goodwill gesture in the form of a voucher to equal (or similar) value towards a different holiday. Unless you're a mad fool, I'm assuming that something major has cropped up (maybe marriage breakup sort of territory etc) hence the desire to cancel the holiday.