Not Being Given Holiday Refund!

x_RC_x

Hi - a group of us were meant to fly out to Las Vegas in June for a Hen Party Holiday.  We booked the holiday in January and paid in instalments  by the beginning of March (before any talk of a lockdown).  As expected, the holiday was cancelled by the travel company the day before we were due to fly out.  We have since tried to contact the company on numerous occasions - initially, they kept offering a credit note to which we responded that we exercised our legal right and wanted our money refunded.  After many email exchanges like this, the company have stopped responding and we are unable to get hold of them at all.  After a few months, we were advised to go to through our banks to claim the money back.  Now the issue is out of the 5 of us travelling, 2 paid by credit card and 3 of us paid by bank transfer.  The latter 3 of us contacted our respective banks at the same time to discuss raising a disputed service claim for the money lost - 2 of us received money back immediately from the bank who were then going to claim it back from the Company.  However, my bank has continually refused to pay - even after taking 15 days to 'investigate', they have deemed it as a buyer/seller dispute.  They claim that as I paid by bank transfer, I am not protected!  But other banks have helped their customers!!  I have spoken to FCA who have also confirmed that they have advised all banks that many people will be in this situation so they need to do everything 'reasonable' to help.  This does seem reasonable to me in any way!! Please help - any advice would be appreciated!!!

[Deleted User]

What company did you book with?  Was it a package holiday?   Did you take out insurance yourself at time of booking?    

x_RC_x

It was TravelDay.  It was a package holiday including everything.  We did as a group, and as far as I am aware the insurance have refunded the money we paid them.  One of the other group members dealt with that so I don't have the full info on that.

Birseh_

So I am clear. Are you saying 1] the insurance refunded your premium or 2] the insurance refunded you the money you lost out on due to a holiday being paid for that you could not then go on?

eskbanker

x_RC_x said:

Now the issue is out of the 5 of us travelling, 2 paid by credit card and 3 of us paid by bank transfer.  The latter 3 of us contacted our respective banks at the same time to discuss raising a disputed service claim for the money lost - 2 of us received money back immediately from the bank who were then going to claim it back from the Company.  However, my bank has continually refused to pay - even after taking 15 days to 'investigate', they have deemed it as a buyer/seller dispute.  They claim that as I paid by bank transfer, I am not protected!  But other banks have helped their customers!!  I have spoken to FCA who have also confirmed that they have advised all banks that many people will be in this situation so they need to do everything 'reasonable' to help.  This does seem reasonable to me in any way!! Please help - any advice would be appreciated!!!

I don't know what you mean by the bolded bit - to the best of my knowledge there is no such process when paying by bank transfer.  Chargeback is available when paying by credit or debit card, and section 75 can also come into play for credit card payments, but there is no equivalent protection for payments made by bank transfer, so it's not a surprise that attempting to make such a claim is rejected.  Do you have any actual hard evidence (e.g. verifiable published authoritative sources) that other banks have refunded customers paying by bank transfer and/or that the FCA have recommended this?

Personally I'd forget about redress via your bank and concentrate on other avenues - if TravelDay are unresponsive or uncooperative and you've exhausted their complaints process then you could escalate to ABTA, as they're members there.  If that doesn't bear fruit then a Letter Before Action ahead of Money Claim Online would be next - your insurance company will expect you to recover losses due to you from the travel supplier rather than paying you back just because the travel company isn't playing ball.