Insurance claim help for Holiday to Lanzarote (on FCDO advice)

sheramber

On THE Beach take the view thye will only refund the flights when the airline refund them.
As Ryanair did not cancel the flight they are not  going to refund meaning On The beach should pay out the refund themselves.
On the Beach are no longer members of ABTA because of this situation.
There were reports of people taking  them to the Small   Claims Court for the  money but I have not seen any updates.

eskbanker

CKhalvashi said:
under my interpretation of the rules (and that of many others here), as there were unforeseeable circumstances outside of your control in relation to the FCDO advice, you have a right to your money back as this was an ATOL protected package, and legally the CC company are in the wrong here.

You're right to apply the bolded caveat, as it isn't cut and dried and there is plenty of scope for discussion and debate about the application of Regulation 12 to this scenario, granting termination rights:

in the event of unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances occurring at the place of destination or its immediate vicinity and which significantly affect —

(a) the performance of the package, or

(b) the carriage of passengers to the destination

There is plenty of guidance and opinion on sites including EU, CMA, ABTA, MSE, etc, but nothing definitive anywhere that I've seen that unequivocally confirms that in itself FCDO advice against travelling triggers this, as this is effectively one step removed from the circumstances at the destination itself that would impact directly on performance or carriage.

If OP's hotel remained open and the flights went ahead, then that substantially weakens the argument that this regulation applies, whatever the FCDO were advising - as I say, it's not cut and dried either way but anyone wishing to claim under s75 does need to be able to demonstrate a breach of contract if expecting the card company to stump up, so if they've disputed the alleged breach then a better line of argument will need to be found.

CKhalvashi

sheramber said:

On THE Beach take the view thye will only refund the flights when the airline refund them.
As Ryanair did not cancel the flight they are not  going to refund meaning On The beach should pay out the refund themselves.
On the Beach are no longer members of ABTA because of this situation.
There were reports of people taking  them to the Small   Claims Court for the  money but I have not seen any updates.

Again, under my interpretation of the rules, this is not the OP's problem.

I read what eskbanker has highlighted as including the FCDO advice (and in addition, any business interest that I may be involved in within travel has done the same), but I don't believe it's been tested in court at this stage.

The courts are backlogged to the extent of anything starting now taking in excess of a year realistically to progress to a judgement, therefore I'm not surprise that nothing has been brought back to work with.

eskbanker

CKhalvashi said:

sheramber said:

On THE Beach take the view thye will only refund the flights when the airline refund them.
As Ryanair did not cancel the flight they are not  going to refund meaning On The beach should pay out the refund themselves.
On the Beach are no longer members of ABTA because of this situation.
There were reports of people taking  them to the Small   Claims Court for the  money but I have not seen any updates.

Again, under my interpretation of the rules, this is not the OP's problem.

I read what eskbanker has highlighted as including the FCDO advice (and in addition, any business interest that I may be involved in within travel has done the same), but I don't believe it's been tested in court at this stage.

The courts are backlogged to the extent of anything starting now taking in excess of a year realistically to progress to a judgement, therefore I'm not surprise that nothing has been brought back to work with.

Trouble is, if neither OTB nor OP's card provider is willing to refund, it very much is OP's problem, even if it arguably shouldn't be!  I do accept that there are (at least) two competing interpretations of the above regulation, but as things stand the burden of proof rests with OP to make a case strong enough to persuade a court (or for the threat of doing so to have the desired effect with either OTB or card company).

I do recognise that the industry isn't all on the same page about this - most reputable package providers refunded (or committed to do so) in such circumstances, and ABTA advised its members to do so, and the CMA has 'encouraged' some laggards to join the party, but there are still some players who don't fall into any of these categories, and so those who booked with them still have work ahead to recover their costs....