Flight Centre uk refund and Section 75 Dispute with AMEX

wincott

Hi 
My wife and myself purchased flight tickets from Flight Centre uk last August 2019 for flights Departing on the 12th Of March this year 2020.

We paid in total £8445.00 split between both our American Express Cards. The flight were from London - Singapore, Singapore - Sydney, Sydney - Auckland, Christchurch - Nadi, Nadi- Brisbane, Brisbane - Singapore, Singapore to London these flight were booked on LH and SQ with the New Zealand portion on NZ and the Nadi flights with Fiji Airways. All long haul sector were in Business class hence the cost.

Our dates and destinations were picked as we were visiting  friends and special places that we had always wanted to go to.

When we left the UK there were no restrictions on the destination countries not to be visited on the Gov Webb site so we had to go or lose our money etc...

When leaving Singapore on the evening of the 15th March to go to Sydney I was advised by a friend in the SQ Business lounge that NZ were going to close the board on the 16th of March at 2359. As we weren't  due to leave SYD until the 19th we would be able to fly to NZ or continue our holiday as planned.  I contacted Flight Centre to advise them that we couldn't get to NZ and this would also stop us getting to Fiji as well and our only option was to pick up our original booked flights from Brisbane back as planned.

The following Day on the 20th March I received a cancellation email of our flights from Fiji Airways with a complete new itinerary changing our flight destinations as follows : Sydney - Auckland, Auckland -Nadi, Nadi - Sydney , Sydney - Singapore, Singapore to London

I call the assistance number for flight centre to advise them that these changes were not where we wanted to fly to and that they seriously impacted our holiday to the point that we wish to return to the uk ASAP.

Flight centre we unable to book any flight which were flyable due to restriction and quarantine being imposed including transits restrictions

I advise them that I had secured flight back with British Airways on the 23rd March from SYD and they said they would start the refund process with the airlines for the used tickets.


To date,  I have received £140 only for the Sydney - Auckland sectors from Flight centre who say they are still waiting for LH and SQ to refund them.

I have spent a lot of time over the past six months chasing Flight centre only to be passed to someone else each time and still waiting for answers to emails and phone calls.

I finally filed a Dispute with Amex under section 75 last week. They came back rejecting our claim for a refund of the un used tickets as they
said " whilst American Express has a direct relationship with Flight Centre London, Under Section 75 , in this instance, Flight centre  Londons services are limited to the services of a travel agent, for example , providing advice and information and acting as an intermediary in the process of booking flight. Based on the information provided we have found no evidence of breach of contract on behalf of Flight centre London in supply  of those services"


I have rejected American Express's response to my claim


Is there any advice out there ? I paid Flight Centre not the Airlines! The changes to origin and destinations were not where I wanted to go or what I paid for !

Anyone got any good tip please





 

Caz3121

how many actual tickets were involved and under which airline were they issued (this may be different from the airlines booked on) which of the flights were actually cancelled by the airline and which were operating but you were unable to take? (refunds will likely be due only for cancelled flights, vouchers possibly for others)
Have you involved your travel insurance?
I know from personal experience LH were very slow - I booked direct and it took 17 weeks for refund

eskbanker

wincott said:

I finally filed a Dispute with Amex under section 75 last week. They came back rejecting our claim for a refund of the un used tickets as they said " whilst American Express has a direct relationship with Flight Centre London, Under Section 75 , in this instance, Flight centre  Londons services are limited to the services of a travel agent, for example , providing advice and information and acting as an intermediary in the process of booking flight. Based on the information provided we have found no evidence of breach of contract on behalf of Flight centre London in supply  of those services"

I have rejected American Express's response to my claim

Is there any advice out there ? I paid Flight Centre not the Airlines!

And therein lies the problem for a s75 claim!  Amex are quite entitled to reject it as there needs to be a direct relationship between debtor (you), creditor (Amex) and the actual service suppliers (the airlines), so by involving an intermediary (Flight Centre) as a fourth party, that nullifies s75 rights, as explained in the MSE article at https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/reclaim/section75-protect-your-purchases/#accordion-content-050641970-1

You're out of time for a chargeback claim, so that just leaves continuing to pursue Flight Centre or your insurer (who'll expect you to continue to pursue Flight Centre if they intimated that they'd refund).