Flight tickets disappearing from the system - who to chase

gmajosie

I cannot believe that I have turned to an on line forum to seek an opinion on who/how to get compensation for a total ticketing shambles, even one as reputable as MSE!

But we are at a loss as to who to pursue and what is the best way to do it.

In September 2024, we bought tickets through a travel agent to fly to Christchurch, New Zealand via China. There were three legs to each of the outbound and return journeys and the tickets were issued by British Airways on behalf of China Southern who had codeshares on the UK legs with BA. The payment (£3,755 including £200 hotel charge) was made to the travel agent. Before the date of the flight, there was a flight change from codeshare to BA's own ticket for the final leg on the return journey to avoid a 24 hour stopover in Heathrow.

To cut a very long story short, there were problems at Heathrow and at Guangzhou getting boarding passes. There was something wrong with the ticketing but we never really understood what the issue was, but we spent several hours at both Heathrow and Guangzhou standing around waiting for someone to resolve it until a senior memeber of China Southern Airlines stepped in and issued emergency boarding passes. There was never any question that we had tickets but some system issue was blocking the production of boarding passes.

On arrival in NZ and again shortly before our scheduled return we contacted the travel agent and asked them to check with BA and ensure we had no such difficulties on the return.

On arriving at Christchurch airport, we were met with a scenario in which, according to the system, one of us had a ticket to Guangzhou, but no onward ticket. The other had no tickets at all. This despite us arriving with all the email and even paper copies of the flight itinerary. We were therefore unable to fly from Christchurch and it transpires the flight we should have been on was the last China Southern flight out of Christchurch that season. All efforts to contact BA were unsuccessful, partly due to time differences and only having a NZ phone at that time.

I therefore booked us on Emirates flights the next day and contacted the travel agent on our return for some sort of recompense.

My question is who do we pursue?

 We have tried BA, the travel agent and China Southern (who have been unable to investigate because our flights have BA reference numbers and E-tickets). We have had a Chargeback claim rejected as being out of time (which was always going to be the case as the fligts were more than 120 days from the booking and payment. I wa sgoing to try a S75 but despite paying the money to the travel agaent, they apparently are untouchable as they are just the ticket issuers, nit the flight providers.

eskbanker

Chargeback may not be out of time, as the 120 days start from the date the service was due to be performed, rather than the transaction date.

S75 may also be viable if it was the agent who breached the contract.

Who is the agent?

Westin

Indeed who is the 'agent'. Hopefully not a shoddy online overseas based ticket seller.

If you look over your original paperwork can you see e-ticket numbers? Something 13-digits, perhaps starting 125 xxxxxxxxxx.

gmajosie

The travel agent is Hays Travel, a normally reputable independent travel agent. 
My bank, Natwest, have already rejected a chargeback claim as being out of time.
On various documents we have a total of 6 different BA e-ticket numbers and I suspect this has been the cause of the problems, but how and why is not clear. Ultimately, if there has been a mess with e-ticket numbers, who has caused it and how do I get recompense?

silvercar

gmajosie said:

The travel agent is Hays Travel, a normally reputable independent travel agent. 
My bank, Natwest, have already rejected a chargeback claim as being out of time.
On various documents we have a total of 6 different BA e-ticket numbers and I suspect this has been the cause of the problems, but how and why is not clear. Ultimately, if there has been a mess with e-ticket numbers, who has caused it and how do I get recompense?

Your contract was with Hays Travel. You used a travel agent to get their services, including assistance when things go wrong, otherwise you might as well have booked direct.

if you have 6 e-ticket numbers that suggests that each ticket has been booked as a separate item. BA ticket numbers usually start 125-…. Generally all connecting flights would be on one ticket number for each person. 

eskbanker

gmajosie said:

In September 2024, we bought tickets...

[...]

We have had a Chargeback claim rejected as being out of time (which was always going to be the case as the fligts were more than 120 days from the booking and payment.

eskbanker said:

Chargeback may not be out of time, as the 120 days start from the date the service was due to be performed, rather than the transaction date.

gmajosie said:

My bank, Natwest, have already rejected a chargeback claim as being out of time.

You'd already said that but my point was were they correct in doing so, as the reason you gave was irrelevant, so when were the flights?