Qatar airways will not give me the refund they owe me

beaufoy

My Details I am a UK citizen who lives in Ireland and Thailand. I booked a flight from Ireland to Thailand and was due to travel 11 th Nov 2021. The flight had to be cancelled and Qatar airways said they would give us a full refund. Six months later there has been no refund. I have threatened Qatar airways with legal action and asked them to supply the address of the office where I should send the papers. Qatar Airways have refused to supply the details of their office which would handle legal disputes. By way of my investigations I have discovered there is no office in Ireland. I have also discovered the tickets from ireland to thailand are issued at Qatar Airways london/mayfair office. Now we have jurisdiction problem of course Qatar Airways and Qatar itself have poor reputations hence I suspect if I used Qatar Airways head office at Doha my papers will be put in the bin. At present my intentions are to continue agrevating qatar airways. Then after a few months make a small claims. I believe I can do the claim from thailand and travel to england if qatar airways want a court hearing. ....of course if i have to go to england i will have to add flight and hotel costs to the claim.  My intention is to name the defendent as qatar airways ticket office mayfair ...strangely enough the qatar airways ticket office in Bangkok has named the London office as being responsible for the refund, but the london office has denied responsibility for the refund

Westin

Was this booked direct with Qatar Airways?
When you say “the flight had to be cancelled” can you elaborate.  Did you cancel your travel perhaps because of entry restrictions into Thailand or illness - or - did QR cancel your flights?

beaufoy

yes the flight was booked online we booked in july 2021 
thailand were late in issuing the thailand pass so we had to cancel
qatar airways do not dispute they owe us a refund and on at least 3 occasions have told us the money will be in our bank account within 1 month

MattMattMattUK

beaufoy said:

yes the flight was booked online we booked in july 2021 
thailand were late in issuing the thailand pass so we had to cancel
qatar airways do not dispute they owe us a refund and on at least 3 occasions have told us the money will be in our bank account within 1 month

What do you mean by "thailand pass", do you mean that you were not eligible to enter Thailand, but the flight itself took place? Was the flight a fully flexible flight? Under what terms did you cancel?

Westin

beaufoy said:

yes the flight was booked online we booked in july 2021 
thailand were late in issuing the thailand pass so we had to cancel
qatar airways do not dispute they owe us a refund and on at least 3 occasions have told us the money will be in our bank account within 1 month

This is good - but I have to say I think surprising.  If you had a full-flexible ticket and the fare rules permitted full refunds then of course there should be no dispute receiving.  I don’t however think many people buy these more expensive ticket types.  Most seem to buy cheaper priced tickets which come with restrictions. During covid Qatar may have been offering some type of travel waiver and credit for those unable to travel on these types of fares.

You should find fare conditions on your e-ticket. I would check through.

If your QR online account is still active I would also check there just to make sure your ‘refund’ is not sitting there as a credit or Q-points.

You might be able to use one of those website that allows views of histrionic website pages.  That might help you find the QR policy at the time for ticket refunds/changes.

You mention QR telling you a refund would be made to your bank account.  Do they have your bank details?  Did you pay directly from your bank rather than a credit card, or have when you made cancellation given them your bank account details? If not is this another possible source of hold up.

If you do decide that you want to send a letter before action, or take the small claims route, then I would use the Qatar Airlines address you have found in London.  

I would really check out that credit voucher vs. cash refund first. 

beaufoy

Thanks you have covered the points quite well. The mail problem is that the bank I paid for the tick is closing down so I closed my account. However, despite never wanting to fly on Qatar again I have told them I will accept a flight credit this kills the bank account excuse

beaufoy

MattMattMattUK said:

beaufoy said:

yes the flight was booked online we booked in july 2021 
thailand were late in issuing the thailand pass so we had to cancel
qatar airways do not dispute they owe us a refund and on at least 3 occasions have told us the money will be in our bank account within 1 month

What do you mean by "thailand pass", do you mean that you were not eligible to enter Thailand, but the flight itself took place? Was the flight a fully flexible flight? Under what terms did you cancel?

It was a fully flexible free change of ticket and refund .....thailand pass was required to enter thailand

beaufoy

Westin said:

beaufoy said:

yes the flight was booked online we booked in july 2021 
thailand were late in issuing the thailand pass so we had to cancel
qatar airways do not dispute they owe us a refund and on at least 3 occasions have told us the money will be in our bank account within 1 month

This is good - but I have to say I think surprising.  If you had a full-flexible ticket and the fare rules permitted full refunds then of course there should be no dispute receiving.  I don’t however think many people buy these more expensive ticket types.  Most seem to buy cheaper priced tickets which come with restrictions. During covid Qatar may have been offering some type of travel waiver and credit for those unable to travel on these types of fares.

You should find fare conditions on your e-ticket. I would check through.

If your QR online account is still active I would also check there just to make sure your ‘refund’ is not sitting there as a credit or Q-points.

You might be able to use one of those website that allows views of histrionic website pages.  That might help you find the QR policy at the time for ticket refunds/changes.

You mention QR telling you a refund would be made to your bank account.  Do they have your bank details?  Did you pay directly from your bank rather than a credit card, or have when you made cancellation given them your bank account details? If not is this another possible source of hold up.

If you do decide that you want to send a letter before action, or take the small claims route, then I would use the Qatar Airlines address you have found in London.  

I would really check out that credit voucher vs. cash refund first. 

If I take qatar to small claims court and have to attend the court in england can i claim airfares flying thailand to england

Westin

beaufoy said:

Thanks you have covered the points quite well. The mail problem is that the bank I paid for the tick is closing down so I closed my account. However, despite never wanting to fly on Qatar again I have told them I will accept a flight credit this kills the bank account excuse

So that might be the issue?  QR have told you that they have refunded but you closed your bank account.  Could the money be sitting in some type of suspense account at your old bank, or have been returned by the old bank to Qatar in the banking system.  The QR agents are unlikely to see detail on their system when you call. Only that a payment was made.

Alan_Bowen

And to answer your question regarding a small claims action against the airline, the only costs the court will award are the court costs incurred in taking the claim. they have the discretion to allow costs necessarily incurred if a defendant acts unreasonably, but you should certainly not issue on the basis you will get the costs of returning from Thailand

beaufoy

Things have progressed
We have a situation where Qatar airways london say all refunds must be issued by head office in qatar
However head office in qatar say my refund has been paid to me. Initally qatar told me my bank account was credited with the refund money. I told Qatar airways that i had contacted my bank and they had no records of a deposit by Qatar airways, I asked for qatar HO to give me the details of the refund ie date amount and bank details to where the refund was paid. The responce I received was that the only details they have was a paid symbol beside my claim number.
     At a latar stage of the conversation qatar ho seemed to agree that the money might have been paid to another dept in Qatar airways who agreed to handling the matter of the refund. Qatar airways HO said they would try to trace who the refund was paid to and ascertain what had been done with my money.....They said when their investigations were completed they would contact me. It has been 3 weeks since said conversation and i have received no info from qatar regarding the money they lost .
       Nobody in Qatar airways will admit to having my money. However I suspect the following.
The debt was taken over by qatar bangkok office, but they decided that because the London office did the ticketing they should also take over the responsibility for the refund so Bangkok passed on all papers to the London office and said papers were then lost