Travel Vouchers - Virgin Atlantic

Ranksy99

Long story short - in 2019 booked 4 return flights to NYC with Virgin Atlantic for a family break in October 2020 - we decided not to fly because of CV19 but the flight never flew anyway du etc lockdown and a travel voucher was received as a matter of course rather than by request

2020 - rebooked for October 2021 and upgraded to premium for same flight with same 4 people - that flight too never left due to travel ban by UK/USA governments and another travel voucher was received

Just tried to rebook again for October 2022 but with just 3 of the original 4 passengers going this time only to be told that we can only use 75% of the balance on that booking reference (£2850.00) as I cannot use the remainder as that passenger was not now travelling and that I had to accept another travel voucher for that person/value (£700) even though I paid for all of the original booking

Although we pulled out of each flight before - neither flight flew or would have allowed us to have travelled

Can Virgin withhold money like this or did I lose any right by 'accepting' these travel vouchers 

Things not helped by Virgin raising fares from £2500.00 for original booking to what would have been £6600.00 for the same flight section in 2022 as to those paid for in 2021

eskbanker

Ranksy99 said:

Although we pulled out of each flight before - neither flight flew or would have allowed us to have travelled

If you cancelled your bookings, rather than them doing so, then your rights are limited and will be defined by the cancellation terms for the bookings concerned, so unless they were fully refundable fares, you probably had little choice other than to accept vouchers, regardless of the later cancellation of the flights.

Having accepted vouchers (assuming you didn't object to them at the time), they're unlikely to have any obligation to buy them back, but what are the terms associated with them, i.e. is there anything that maps them to individual passengers rather than being a collective lump sum?

Ranksy99

The original booking was for non-refundable tickets

Only did the second lot of Travel Vouchers list individual voucher numbers per original passenger - so four were issued against our booking reference. 

Having just checked emails form the time - it appears the first flight that didn't happen in 2020 - only the flight booking reference was made as a collective Voucher.

Ranksy99

eskbanker said:

Ranksy99 said:

Although we pulled out of each flight before - neither flight flew or would have allowed us to have travelled

If you cancelled your bookings, rather than them doing so, then your rights are limited and will be defined by the cancellation terms for the bookings concerned, so unless they were fully refundable fares, you probably had little choice other than to accept vouchers, regardless of the later cancellation of the flights.

Having accepted vouchers (assuming you didn't object to them at the time), they're unlikely to have any obligation to buy them back, but what are the terms associated with them, i.e. is there anything that maps them to individual passengers rather than being a collective lump sum?

But then - what kind of choice is that? Accept a voucher on our terms for loose your money??

eskbanker

Ranksy99 said:

eskbanker said:

Ranksy99 said:

Although we pulled out of each flight before - neither flight flew or would have allowed us to have travelled

If you cancelled your bookings, rather than them doing so, then your rights are limited and will be defined by the cancellation terms for the bookings concerned, so unless they were fully refundable fares, you probably had little choice other than to accept vouchers, regardless of the later cancellation of the flights.

Having accepted vouchers (assuming you didn't object to them at the time), they're unlikely to have any obligation to buy them back, but what are the terms associated with them, i.e. is there anything that maps them to individual passengers rather than being a collective lump sum?

But then - what kind of choice is that? Accept a voucher on our terms for loose your money??

Well maybe not ideal, but in circumstances where you presumably weren't entitled to a cash refund then it's as good as you're going to get - even being offered vouchers when choosing to cancel non-refundable bookings was probably a concession rather than an entitlement as such?