Flight centre stuff up - what to do?

[zzyss]

Last week, my parents booked a flight to Hong Kong through Flight Centre on the Singapore airlines deal. They booked, paid and received an itinerary and thought that everything was OK.

But then yesterday they rang and said that due to a problem "out of their control" Singapore Airlines did not allocate them the seats, and that they had to cancel the booking. Obviously my parents are furious.

Flight Centre offered to give them a flight on Malaysia Airlines instead, but with an overnight stopover in Kuala Lumpur, which my parents are unhappy with.

Considering the circumstances (and not knowing the true nature of the Flight Centre stuff up), what recourse would my parents be entitled to, or does the offer of an alternative flight with Malaysian meet any legal obligations that the company owes them (morally, it's a different story - but I'm under no delusion that the company will act morally).

 

[james4321]

I can understand that you and your parents are furious!!. Irrespective of the "legalities" I would expect the agent to do everything possible to satisfy the customer - after all it is certainly not your fault, and (while technically it might not be theirs either) I would have thought in the current economic circumstances that they would want to ensure that customer service was paramount.
There are plenty of flights direct Sydney - Hong Kong so I would be telling Flight Centre that the offer of an indirect through KL is not acceptable, and insist on a direct booking. You need to deal with the FC location in the first instance, but if you dont get any satisfaction then contact the State Manager at HO.

 

[FL360]

Consider this as a lesson and next time help your parents to book online....

I would not use a travel agent (unless you are given a FC gift voucher) for these simple flights....

But if I am you I would get the money back and try to book MH online...

 

[Alanslegal]

Last week, my parents booked a flight to Hong Kong through Flight Centre on the Singapore airlines deal. They booked, paid and received an itinerary and thought that everything was OK.

But then yesterday they rang and said that due to a problem "out of their control" Singapore Airlines did not allocate them the seats, and that they had to cancel the booking. Obviously my parents are furious.

(maybe someone can correct me) but it is only when the airline tickets the ticket that you actually get the ticket. [now I dare you to say that 10x but really fast ]

I believe FC reserves an itinerary (gives you one of their reference numbers) then queue's it to SQ for ticketing. And by the time SQ has got around to the reservation, there are no more available seats (at that fare bucket etc).

 

[Mark]

Yesterday I booked Webjet malaysian to London rt. They say they guarantee the price but looking at the reference immediately afterwards it is clear that it has not been allocated by the airline.

Meanwhile checking prices/availability on Malaysian changes are as frequent as stock price volatility on the ASX !

 

[MelUser]

I think this is another Flight Centre lesson. There have been numerous incidents mentioned here.

I friend of mine had an issue with intrepid tours - similar issue - SQ cancelled out the seats. She argued with them (intrepid) and intrepid did the right thing and bore the cost and she travelled in business class.

It sounds like it might be an SQ overbooking thing too.

 

[Travel Guru]

FC don't queue their bookings through to SQ, they have their own in house ticketing team who ticket all bookings.

There's so much BS in what FC have told you that I don't know where to start.

If they held a confirmed booking for your parents, the only way it could have been cancelled is if the agent missed a vendor remark from the airline re and auto cancel date and the airline HX'd the flights.

Aside from that situation, the only other thing that could have happened was the agent missing the ticketing time limit on the special and then being up for the standard fare.

It has nothing to do with not being able to get allocation from SQ, if they held a confirmed booking to begin with and ticketed it in time, there'd be no way SQ could take away that allocation.

They're obviously spinning a yarn (something FC agents are very good at) in order to avoid wearing a large negative on their commission from having to give you what you've got.

If your parents A. Have an invoice and B. Paid that invoice, then they have to honour it, and i'd be avoiding dealing with the store who have a vested interest in reducing any loss and calling the national complaints line to get the problem sorted.

If I can offer any assistance, feel free to PM me, i spent many years with FC before starting my own agency so know the inner workings quite well.

TG

 

[MelUser]

I agree with TG.

Some airlines, like Cathay Pacific and United Airlines - do send messages to a travel agent saying if the ticket is not paid for then the reservation will be cancelled. BUT, Cathay doesn't follow through immediately and gives the Travel Agent time to sort everything out.

Singapore Airlines appears to be very rigid - if you miss a ticketing/payment deadline they will cancel everything out of the system - no second chances!

However, this is not the customer's problem.

A good travel agent sends everything off for payment in time.

 

[Travel Guru]

SQ's are all computerised and automated where I believe some airlines still manually have staff go through an HX those who aren't complied by.

I'd settle for nothing less than what you paid for, even if FC have to cop the difference.

TG

 

[zzyss]

Thanks everybody for the good advice so far, and your offer of help Travel Guru.

The branch has arranged my dad a "chat" with their manager, so we'll see how that goes first, but the national office complaints sounds like the next port of call regardless. My only concern is if they manage to somehow bully my parents into a position where they end up having to relent - are there any pitfalls to avoid?

The travel dates aren't until November, so there's plenty of time for them to make good My mum said that she's sure that the agent that they dealt with was new, and thinks that it could possibly be that person's fault.

If I had know my parents were going to book, I would have done it for them I told them of the deal a few weeks ago and they didn't mention that they were thinking of going. I bought tickets for my wife and I directly from the Singapore Airlines Website (paid by Amex, no surcharge, yay!).

 

[Travel Guru]

Just tell them to stand their ground and accept no other resolution than the reinstatement of their flight on Singapore Airlines.

It's obviously the consultants stuff up so theyre going to spin your parents whatever story they can to take the blame off themselves and resolve it as cheaply as possible, even if it means offering them a less convenient airline.

In the end, the agent has to give them what is paid for, they have a binding contract, but that doesn't mean they won't do their best to minimise losses by having the customer agree to something else.

TG

 

[Alanslegal]

FC don't queue their bookings through to SQ, they have their own in house ticketing team who ticket all bookings.

And with that - I am duly corrected and great info there TG

 

[Mal]

Yeah, heard a similar story on another forum recently. The FC staffer missed the deadline for the SQ ticket (the recent ones had a shorter timeframe I believe than usual for deadline) and then fobbed off the passengers and rebooked them on a poorer timed flight (days didn't match up).

Shonky behaviour.

 

[Keith009]

I agree with TG and MelUser. This sure sounds like an instance where the consultant has failed to comply with the ticketing deadline set by the airline (these messages are often v specific, right down to the hour), with the consequence being that seats will be canceled after the deadline has passed.

I can see how this might happen on RTW tickets where there might be multiple deadlines when a few carriers are involved (even then it's still poor), but in this instance with a simple return itinerary there's really no excuse!

 

[Travel Guru]

Let us know how they get on zzyss, always interested in hear the outcome, especially when it comes to your local "friendly" FC agent.

TG

 

[pully]

we can share a recent story re flight centre.
we booked and paid in full, for a trip to see chelsea flower show plus other places.
the duration was about 5 weeks. we were required to pay in full in nov 2008. the agent also booked non refund qf flights. we were told the tour was going ahead at that time.
about 4 weeks before we were to leave we get a call from the agent to say some minor changes.
alarm bells. the changes were not minor in fact the tour was never fully subcribed, we later found out. the changes were not what we had paid for, lower standard etc.
we got advice complained that it was not acceptable. we were very disappointed. the complaints dept to their credit gave us a full refund of the tour.
we still wanted to proceed so we kept flights as is not sure if these could have been refunded anyway.
we have since made our own land arrangements. we will not use flight centre again.
regards

 

[Travel Guru]

we can share a recent story re flight centre.
we booked and paid in full, for a trip to see chelsea flower show plus other places.
the duration was about 5 weeks. we were required to pay in full in nov 2008. the agent also booked non refund qf flights. we were told the tour was going ahead at that time.
about 4 weeks before we were to leave we get a call from the agent to say some minor changes.
alarm bells. the changes were not minor in fact the tour was never fully subcribed, we later found out. the changes were not what we had paid for, lower standard etc.
we got advice complained that it was not acceptable. we were very disappointed. the complaints dept to their credit gave us a full refund of the tour.
we still wanted to proceed so we kept flights as is not sure if these could have been refunded anyway.
we have since made our own land arrangements. we will not use flight centre again.
regards

With all due respect Pully this sounds like a tour operator issue not something Flight Centre did wrong.
Unfortunately the same thing could have happened with any agent as tour operators cancel tours quite regularly or combine 2 tours if they haven't got enough numbers (something that is going to happen quite alot this year unfortunately).

As annoying as I can appreciate it was, the agent in those instances is merely left stuck in the middle forced to play the role of bad cop and tell you your tours been cancelled when it was completely out of him/her hands.
If they mentioned it was minor it was probably just their trepidation in being forced to be the one to tell you of the changes.

I do hope the trip goes well for you.

TG

 

[pully]

thanks for that comment.
the tour was actually one marketed and put together as flight centre,s own, by one of their staff. albeit in conjunction with the tour operators, 2 well known upmarket ones.
we contacted the tour operator after flight centres rep told us of the changes.
the tour operator said the tour only had 6 people.
flight centre would have known, even if people withdrew at short notice.
if there was any doubt about the tour proceeding we should have been told early and certainly not after they had booked non refundable air tickets.
i am aware tours are being cancelled because of the economic times.
it has been a valuable learning experience.
we have been able to book things ourselves and now hope for the best.
it was disappointing. but we have to move on.

 

[zzyss]

Let us know how they get on zzyss, always interested in hear the outcome, especially when it comes to your local "friendly" FC agent.

TG

Nothing to report so far. The manager of the FC branch was supposed to call my dad yesterday to "discuss", but nothing happened. Funny thing is, the Malaysian airlines deal that FC offered as an alternative to SIA has also expired - you would have thought that they'd try to get my parents to agree to that with some urgency if they had any hope of minimising the cost of their mistake, but nope.

Considering that FC is still holding the money, my parents are quite happy to wait for a better outcome, since the trip isn't for another 6 months anyway.

 

[zzyss]

Here's the final update: Flight Centre called my dad last night, and they said that they will honour the contract and reinstate their flight exact as per originally booked.

No idea whether FC absorbed the cost of buying the tickets at the non-sale price, or whether they got lucky and somebody else cancelled.

It's as good a result can be hoped for.