Credit card claim for cancelled holiday

CyprusBoy

 We had to cancel, at 24-hours notice, a family package holiday with Jet2 to Spain 3 weeks ago as my 2-year-old granddaughter caught chicken pox.

I booked and paid for the holiday and travel insurance but naively booked two separate policies; one for my wife, son & me who have declarable health issues, and a further policy (with Insure&Escape) for my stepson, his partner and their 2 little ones.

Claims have been submitted but both providers are suggesting a probable 6-week delay in processing. We have had nothing formal yet from Insure&Escape but I’ve since read that there is a very good chance they won’t pay out for my step-son’s claim as the policy is in his name (my email address and my credit card) and he personally has “suffered no financial loss”.

The holiday was paid for using my credit card with the balance, the bulk, of the cost (£6.3k) paid on June 9th. My query is whether I can claim against my credit card under the Consumer Credit Act for the probable non-payment of my step-son and family’s insurance and as the 90 days since June 9th will be up next week do I need to do anything pre-emptive now?

jon81uk

If you are cancelling then you need to claim on the travel insurance.
Any claim from a credit card is because you are owed from the merchant and unless Jet2 allow cancellations with less than 24 hours notice you are not owed anything from them.

user1977

As above - Jet2 (and the credit card) don't owe you anything. This is what travel insurance is for.

Ergates

Even if you believed the insurance were wrongly refusing to pay out, the best you could do is reclaim the cost of the insurance - but even that sounds unlikely to succeed from what you're described.

pinkshoes

As above, you can only claim what the policy allows.

Also, why didn't one person stay behind with the chicken pox child and the rest of you go?? Once the spots were scabbed over they could have then come out to join you.

Some airlines even let children fly with chickenpox!! 

Gavin83

Did the policy specifically state you were able to cancel if one member of the group couldn't travel? If the insurance agree the granddaughter couldn't travel I suspect their argument would be that a parent would need to stay behind too but there's no reason the rest of you couldn't travel. 

They may well pay out, you'll have to await their decision but if they provide the above argument as to a reason to avoid the claim I suspect you might struggle to counter it.

Whatever the outcome the credit card angle is a no go. You can't claim against Jet2 as it was your decision to cancel and as you made the payment to Jet2 you can't then claim that from the credit card company. Your best bet is to await the decision and if it goes against what you'd like read the terms and conditions of your insurance product carefully. If you find they've broken them you might be able to take them to court.

DullGreyGuy

CyprusBoy said:
I’ve since read that there is a very good chance they won’t pay out for my step-son’s claim as the policy is in his name (my email address and my credit card) and he personally has “suffered no financial loss”

You've been reading the wrong sources... he has suffered a loss... he was due to go on a £1,000 holiday (or whatever the cost is) and now isnt and so £1,000 less the excess is appropriate compensation for him.

Presumably you gifted the holiday to him, but it is you that has suffered no financial loss... you intentionally gave him a gift and he received that gift.

It is always the traveller that makes the claim not the random person that happened to pay for it.

sheramber

DullGreyGuy said:

CyprusBoy said:
I’ve since read that there is a very good chance they won’t pay out for my step-son’s claim as the policy is in his name (my email address and my credit card) and he personally has “suffered no financial loss”

You've been reading the wrong sources... he has suffered a loss... he was due to go on a £1,000 holiday (or whatever the cost is) and now isnt and so £1,000 less the excess is appropriate compensation for him.

Presumably you gifted the holiday to him, but it is you that has suffered no financial loss... you intentionally gave him a gift and he received that gift.

It is always the traveller that makes the claim not the random person that happened to pay for it.

Is it not the policy holder who makes the claim under the travel insurance policy?

CyprusBoy

DullGreyGuy said:

CyprusBoy said:
I’ve since read that there is a very good chance they won’t pay out for my step-son’s claim as the policy is in his name (my email address and my credit card) and he personally has “suffered no financial loss”

You've been reading the wrong sources... he has suffered a loss... he was due to go on a £1,000 holiday (or whatever the cost is) and now isnt and so £1,000 less the excess is appropriate compensation for him.

Presumably you gifted the holiday to him, but it is you that has suffered no financial loss... you intentionally gave him a gift and he received that gift.

It is always the traveller that makes the claim not the random person that happened to pay for it.

Many thanks for the prompt and constructive reply. My source is "Sally sorts it" in the Daily Mail on July 26th where a similar claim with Direct Line went to the Ombudsman but was still not successful. 

Gavin83

For what it's worth despite the complicated double policy situation I actually think your stepsons policy has a far greater chance of paying out than your own. If I was to predict the outcome from this I think your stepsons policy will pay out but yours won't. Not really sure if that's a better or worse outcome than what you were expecting.

Undervalued

pinkshoes said:

As above, you can only claim what the policy allows.

Also, why didn't one person stay behind with the chicken pox child and the rest of you go?? Once the spots were scabbed over they could have then come out to join you.

Some airlines even let children fly with chickenpox!! 

Exactly. With any insurance (or legal claim) you have a duty to make reasonable efforts to minimise your losses. Just because somebody else is at fault (or because you are insured) doesn't mean you can run up as big a bill as possible.

On the face of it (but maybe there is a good reason why not) that would be a sensible compromise.