Comparetheairportparking.com - disgusting behaviour regarding refunds

ajtrader100

Like many on here I was looking forward to getting away but the current pandemic left us no choice but to cancel (we should have flown out last Friday). We were fortunate that almost everything was refunded in the run up to departure, just one Airbnb booking was transferred to a voucher. The last one to tackle was the airport parking, which was booked through comparetheairportparking.com - it was under £100 but still worth trying to get back. Multiple attempts were made to contact them, the first on April 2nd and only after chasing on the phone and several emails they came back today and stated that:

<p><i>"Sorry for the late reply and apologies for any inconvenience caused by the delay.</i></p><p><i>We have received an unprecedented amount of cancellation requests from the
customer's and as a small company we arent ready to deal with all of them at
once as we have never dealt with anything like this before. We normally process
a refund within 2 weeks but right now it can take between 10 to 12 weeks
minimum because of the workload.</i></p><p><i>Please refer to our terms and conditions to see if you have booked a Non-refundable
booking and if you qualify for a refund. "</i></p>

https://www.comparetheairportparking.com/Home/Pages/?PageName=Airport%20Parking%20Terms%20and%20Conditions

In their T's & C's it states that:

5. Customer Cancellations, Refunds and Amendments 

• All cancellations, for whatever reason, are subject to a minimum £20 administration charge. ComapreTheAirportParking.com will provide a refund to the value of your booking less the £20 administration charge.
• The following conditions apply for Flexible Product cancellations 
• All Non-Flexible Product, Super Saver deals and frozen orders are non-refundable. 

So they aren't going to refund as my booking wasn't a flexible booking and even if I could they would take £20 as an administration charge. Looking into this I read into the Consumer and Markets Authority advice on refunds, here is what they state:

Non-refundable payments and fees
In the CMA’s view, the above rights to a refund will usually apply even where the consumer has paid what the business says is a non-refundable deposit or advance payment.
The CMA also considers that businesses should not charge an admin fee (or equivalent) for processing refunds in the above circumstances.

and in addition

The position in most cases
Where a contract is not performed as agreed, the CMA considers that consumer protection law will generally allow consumers to obtain a refund.
In particular, for most consumer contracts the CMA would expect a consumer to be offered a full refund where:
a business has cancelled a contract without providing any of the promised goods or services;
no service is provided by a business, for example because this is prevented by Government public health measures;
a consumer cancels, or is prevented from receiving any services, because Government public health measures mean they are not allowed to use the services.

I have put the ball back in their court, with the facts above. I would suggest any else suffering from this ridiculous stance to do the same. If I don't get anywhere I will be reporting them here - https://www.coronavirus-business-complaint.service.gov.uk/

I would again ask that anyone else having the same problems do the same.

ajtrader100

Amend: this was their full reply, I don't know why it cropped the quote
"Sorry for the late reply and apologies for any inconvenience caused by the delay.

We have received an unprecedented amount of cancellation requests from the customer's and as a small company we arent ready to deal with all of them at once as we have never dealt with anything like this before. We normally process a refund within 2 weeks but right now it can take between 10 to 12 weeks minimum because of the workload.

Please refer to our terms and conditions to see if you have booked a Non-refundable booking and if you qualify for a refund."

 

heatherw_01

Hi, we move threads if we think they’ll get more help elsewhere (please read the forum rule) so this post/thread has been moved to another board. If you have any questions about this policy please email forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com.