We have taken Jet2 to court over refusing refund of holiday deposit - and won

StuieUK34

Following.....
Hope you smack Jet2 in the nuts.
I would'nt use that firm before reading this, and still wont use them after reading this.

I see things in laymens terms.
Contract a painter to paint my house blue, and pay him a deposit..
Painter states he can only get light blue, and only cover 60% of the house.
Thats breach, in laymens.
Good on you stoem!

CKhalvashi

StuieUK34 said:

Following.....
Hope you smack Jet2 in the nuts.
I would'nt use that firm before reading this, and still wont use them after reading this.

I see things in laymens terms.
Contract a painter to paint my house blue, and pay him a deposit..
Painter states he can only get light blue, and only cover 60% of the house.
Thats breach, in laymens.
Good on you stoem!

Once again, 3 months out wasn't reasonable from the OP.

So, in laymens terms:
Contract a painter to paint my house blue, and pay him a deposit..
Cancel to the painter after a shortage of blue paint when there is no indication of whether blue paint will be available.

I don't think OP has a case here, OP feels they do. I am interested in the result on a personal and professional level, but don't believe it will go in OP's favour under legislation. Package travel is much more regulated in the event of cancellations than painters and the correct legal process was not followed.

Thrugelmir

StuieUK34 said:

I see things in laymens terms.
Contract a painter to paint my house blue, and pay him a deposit..
Painter states he can only get light blue, and only cover 60% of the house.
Thats breach, in laymens.
Good on you stoem!

The origins of contract law date back many centuries. Unfortunately it's not open to personal interpretation. 

michael1234

To those who seem a little too keen on the OP losing his case I can only add my personal experience. Running an online business at the time, I was confident I would win against a claim made against us by a customer.

The judge was actually very pleasant but started off by saying something like "....there is a lot of consumer focused legislation aimed at protecting consumers....." . Suffice to say I lost, wrote a cheque in front of the judge and claimant to avoid a "ccj" and it was smiles all round. I learned my lesson.

The Jet2 solicitor will know this and almost certainly settle. Let's see....

stoem

Update. As expected, Jet2 have rejected my claim.

I have rejected their response which once again contained a rehash of falsehoods including downgrading the information that the hotel published on its own website as 'hearsay' and that we couldn't have known the limitations at the hotel would be in place at the date of travel. I told them numerous times (and sent them the PDF) that the hotel closed these facilities FOR THE SEASON. 
It seems Jet2 cannot make up their mind about their own position. They keep stating that only with 'benefit of hindsight' were we able to know that these changes happened when in fact we told them about the changes which the hotel published BEFORE we decided to cancel. They are also still holding the position that even with those changes there was no breach of contract. I disagree. 

For the commenters here, I am pursuing this claim after having sought professional legal advice. The solicitor wouldn't even have engaged with me had they considered this to be a hopeless case. They thought I have at least a 50% chance of winning and that I should test this in front of a judge. I'm simply taking their advice, I would have stopped right away had they advised me of the opposite. 

Personally, I would have loved to go on this holiday. We went the year before and rebooked afterwards. This also meant we knew how much the closure of said facilities would impact us. Had Jet2 offered a reduced price I would have agreed; they didn't. They wanted to charge full price for a service that was evidently reduced from what was agreed.

It's now down to a judge to decide I guess. It's worth the challenge IMO. 

CKhalvashi

I sincerely wish you the best of luck in court, even if I don't agree with your legal assessment of your case from an unqualified point of view, with full reasons stated above, but such a case will provide some clarity on interpretation of the legislation to many businesses and consumers.

Please do report back with your result, as I'm sure several people here are waiting with interest. I fully understand your personal feelings here, and if the professional advice you have been given counteracts our opinion, then this is what your lawyers are paid for.

Once again, good luck!

stoem

I'm preparing court documents, a trial date has been set for February 2022.

stoem

Could anyone with experience in the small claims court help me with the following. The defendant has sent me their paperwork including a witness statement of a call handler/customer service rep whose statement doesn't offer any new evidence.
On the contrary, the statement does not suggest that they were the person that took my call and my own notes which reference the cancellation call specifically have a name that differs from that of the witness.

Question:
Am I able to cross examine or ask questions of the witness in court? I won't post the questions I have in mind here but I feel they'd be very enlightening to the judge.

Thanks.

eskbanker

stoem said:

Am I able to cross examine or ask questions of the witness in court?

Isn't that a question for the solicitor you engaged, rather than random anonymous internet strangers whose experiences may or may not actually be relevant to your case?

CKhalvashi

You will be able to ask questions if the judge deems it suitable for you to do so.

The witness may be a supervisor, and it may be worth SAR'ing for the call recording, however it may be the case that it's refused on the basis of privacy for the employee, but should be made available for the court if required.