Virgin flight cancelled, expenses question?

Twinsdad1844

Hi,

Mine and my wife's flights return flights from Vegas to Manchester for the 2nd August were cancelled by Virgin and we immediately rebooked their next available flight through the app.

This flight was operated by KLM which flew from Vegas to Amsterdam and then on to Manchester, we booked seats on both of those flights which cost £125 each.

Virgin have paid the compensation due for the delay in returning but are refusing to reimburse the £250 we paid to book our seats with KLM, as it turns out the KLM flight was overbooked and I doubt we would have been able to board the flight if we had not booked seats.

They are citing this as the reason for refusal -I  regret to inform you that the seat fees you purchased with KLM are not covered under EC Care regulations, and therefore, we are unable to offer a refund for those seats.

My view is I am £250 out of pocket as a direct consequence of Virgin cancelling our flights, what do you think, I have already pushed back once but got the same reply?

Many thanks

eskbanker

The UK/EU 261 flight delay/cancellation regulations do oblige airlines to fund replacement flights when cancelling, but there's no liability to pay for seat bookings on those.  If you'd paid Virgin for seats originally then they may be willing to refund those, although again it's unclear that there's actually any legal obligation to do so....

Hoenir

Twinsdad1844 said:

Virgin have paid the compensation due for the delay in returning but are refusing to reimburse the £250 we paid to book our seats with KLM, as it turns out the KLM flight was overbooked and I doubt we would have been able to board the flight if we had not booked seats.

You booked the seats prior to knowing this. Hindsight as to what might or not happened isn't relevant. 

Twinsdad1844

Hoenir said:

Twinsdad1844 said:

Virgin have paid the compensation due for the delay in returning but are refusing to reimburse the £250 we paid to book our seats with KLM, as it turns out the KLM flight was overbooked and I doubt we would have been able to board the flight if we had not booked seats.

You booked the seats prior to knowing this. Hindsight as to what might or not happened isn't relevant. 

Quite right, point being in hindsight we did the right thing to book seats.

bagand96

Whether a passenger has pre-booked a seat or not may have little relevance in deciding who is offloaded in the event of an overbooking.  There's no way to prove that theory either way.

Virgin met their obligations in rebooking you a new flight and have paid the fixed compensation due under EC261.  You chose to book an added extra on your new flight and that is an arrangement between you and KLM.  Agree with the other posters that there doesn't appear to be a legal basis that Virgin have to pay for your added extras with KLM, or even refund any seat fees you'd paid them (although that may be a better angle to go at if looking for a goodwill gesture).