The new HFP chat thread – Wednesday 25th March

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• Pug206 says:

  25 Mar25 March 08:02

  Anyone tried to cancel an Avis car hire booking booked through BA pls? Tried doing it through manage my booking but no option to cancel.

  • Nicky says:

    25 Mar25 March 08:23

    To cancel an Avis car booking made by BA you have to actually ring up. I did this a couple of months ago and got a full refund minus a few pounds cancellation fee

    • Pug206 says:

      25 Mar25 March 11:25

      Thank you.

• MartinF says:

  25 Mar25 March 08:09

  I’m after some advice please folks. In the grand scheme of things it’s not that important but I could still do with sorting it. I’ve used 150k miles + cash taxes to book three seats for my family four for LHR-LAX return late July (booked in January), plus £500 for the extra cash child return ticket. Do I ask for refund on the three miles tickets? I’m guessing I’ll get miles back and all cash except £30 each seat? What do I get back from the child cash ticket? Tempted to cancel the trip now, because if I don’t and Virgin goes bust I’ll lose the lot. Plus I can’t see the US being back up and running by July. I paid for the taxes and child ticket using credit card.

  • Shoestring says:

    25 Mar25 March 08:20

    Could be nobody knows the position on the child seat return – I don’t – I guess this is a points booking in totality so you should get the £500 back

    eg on a RFS flight now (points + money) you can choose various cash amounts way in excess of £17.50/ £35 RFS fee, but you still get all your cash (and points) back minus the RFS fee

    you could go all the way through to the end of the workaround online cancellation process and some people have said the screen tells them what the refund amount will be (mine didn’t) – & if you are happy with it, go ahead otherwise abort process

• AJ says:

  25 Mar25 March 08:48

  Gone short EZJ this morning given the news out last night – highly likely they’ll have to tap into shareholders to keep them afloat and destroy shareholder value given the amount they’ll require. Who’s joining for the ride?!

  • The Lord says:

    25 Mar25 March 08:56

    Not looking great so far +7% this morning

    • AJ says:

      25 Mar25 March 09:23

      riding the wider market trump pump at the moment, things will turn soon. Saved some more ammo for 700-750 incase

  • Paul Pogba says:

    25 Mar25 March 10:12

    I’d short Facebook and Twitter before easyjet, they’re advertising platforms and by all accounts revenue is down bigly. I’m also tempted to short JPY.

• Clive says:

  25 Mar25 March 08:49

  Morning,
  Does anyone know how the vouchers from BA work? I had a Partner Reward seat booked using cash and Avios. Received the voucher today but it does not indicate any value. No Avios have been returned either. Pretty confusing.
  Thanks

• pompeypoints says:

  25 Mar25 March 08:52

  Hi All – have you seen Avios are doing their 18,000 Avios offer with the economist, if people are still looking for good collection deals at this strange time it’s a good earn!

  • TGLoyalty says:

    25 Mar25 March 15:21

    I was waiting for another miles and more version so hopefully it’ll follow this Avios one

• Caley says:

  25 Mar25 March 09:03

  Hello. I’m due to fly EasyJet on Friday to France. Outbound is showing as cancelled. I don’t want to change the flight. I can’t get through to them for a refund. If I am unable to get through (I keep getting recorded messages and then they hang up) by my departure time what will happen? Will I automatically get a refund? Or might it be a voucher? Any help appreciated

  • Charlieface says:

    25 Mar25 March 09:39

    Makes no difference what they give you. You still have a right to either a reroute or a cash refund. If you can’t get through call your credit card and claim S.75

    • Lady London says:

      25 Mar25 March 10:47

      Can I ask advice ?

      easyJet have cancelled flights on me this week too.

      Most of my bookings with easyJet have about 12 flights on them. Flights are all over the place – routes don’t link up. Often there isn’t even a return on the same route within the same booking. Most of my outward and returns are on completely different bookings.

      However in the case of one outward flight cancelled by easyJet this week, which is about the 5th flight o the booking, I do have the exact matching return flight as the 12th flight on the booking.

      So unusually – as normally when easyJet cancels a flight its return, if any, is on some other booking so I can only rebook or refund the outgoing flight – yesterday I phoned easyJet and requested a refund on flights 5 and 12 (a perfect matching outward and return) o the booking.

      easyJet refused to refund the return flight, even though it’s the only return on the same route as the cancelled outward flight on the booking. There’s a second flight on the same route in between but no other return. In between the two there are flights on other routes.

      easyJet is saying that they’ll only refund the outward flight no. 5 and not the return flight No.12 because around flight No.10 there’s a duplicate outward. They say the duplicate outward no. 10 is the outward flight for No.12 so they won’t refund no.12 as the return of this week’s cancelled flight No. 5. Frankly by the time we got to that time, it’s highly likely that flight 10 would have been rebooked to another route/flight at a different time.

      Can easyJet refuse to refund the only other flight on the booking that’s a return same route for the outward flight they’ve cancelled?

      I’ve been paying extra to move flights as I will always be flying eventually and not taking refunds unless forced to.

      Am thinking “OK, if you want to reinvent the rules you’ve previously indicated that the return had to be on same booking and same route and in the opposite direction, and now I actually have a booking with a matching return flight, and you’re changing the rules to try to tell me you won’t refund the only eligible return flight on the booking for your cancelled outbound…..TBH I don’t feel like supporting easyJet anymore.

      Do I have the right to phone up and say OK if that’s what you want then I’m exercising my right to cancel the entire remainder of the booking and you can refund all remaining flights instead????? I have easily enough flights to replace the ones I would lose this way.

      • PJJ says:

        25 Mar25 March 14:06

        @Charlieface and @Lady London, please let us know how you get on
        I have a flight with Easyjet on the 16th April and back the next day. They are showing flights to Nice cancelled yesterday, today and the 27th, however 26th showing 1 flight due to go ahead.
        Waiting for them to advise my flight is cancelled

      • Zara says:

        25 Mar25 March 15:05

        I’m sorry I can’t be of any help. My March flights are cancelled and the email said I can get a refund but I have to call up for it and the line just goes dead so that’s not quite working out!

        • Lady London says:

          25 Mar25 March 21:56

          If you call around 3-4pm you can often get through relatively easily. Any time after 5pm forget if they’re busy because that’s when people who were stuck in work all day start calling.

          You could think mornings would be fine too for the same reason but I haven’t found that. I suspect their shift rotas start mainly in the afternoon so from around 2.30pm. just guessing.

          I personally think Easyjet’s South African Call Centre is its biggest aset. I don’t agree with the rules that keep nontransparently changing all the time, such as they now whack a non-public on when you need to phone up to change something (they use a much higher secret pricing list instead of the prices you can see on the internet) but their South African call centre is a good mix of people who seem well managed and excellently helpful and efficient.

      • Charlieface says:

        25 Mar25 March 17:03

        You don’t really have any rights as these are all separate bookings. Might be worth moving the offending flight so that they can’t link it with the one you want to refund, then call again

        • Lady London says:

          25 Mar25 March 17:19

          @Charlieface each of the two bookings so far, has a cancellation.
          There are flights left on the booking – probably about 6-9 flights unflown on each after the cancelled flights this week. I’m hoping EU261 might let me say I want a refund of everything unflown on them.
          The difference is that Easyjet lets you put up to 12 flights on the one booking, that dont really have to be related or follow one another logically, but they all have the same reference.

          So on a BA PNR I know I can cancel all further flights on the same booking following their cancelled flight – no matter how many. Easyjet flights are all under the same reference – just not as logically linkeed to each other. It would save me a lot of stress if I could reduce my number of flights this way now that we can;t fly anywhere for ages – they take a lot of time to manage.
          Just not sure if EU261 right to refund rest of the booking would work the same way – literally, it would, but wondering how sensible it would be given the flights left on the booking are on different routes and not in a logical sequence – but they are all under one PNR, as it were.

      • Lady London says:

        25 Mar25 March 17:06

        @PJJ as of yesterday evening 24th March I had only received Easyjet cancellations up to and including the 27th., Today an agent told me a flight on my booking on 28th was also cancelled and has only appeared since yesterday in mange my booking as an extra cancelled flight on same booking.

        If you try to search flights on your route as though you wanted to book them again, you will probably see what I’m seeing – completed blank calendar for the whole of April with every flight marked “Sold Out”.

  • Rob says:

    25 Mar25 March 09:50

    I thought all easyJet flights were cancelled? You would therefore be due a refund regardless.

    • JeffStrongman says:

      25 Mar25 March 12:53

      Etihad seem to want to ignore their own rules, terms and conditions, consumer law and any sort of moral obligations. How can they refuse to refund for a cancelled flight. What is the use of a travel credit if I have lost my job and need the refund to pay bills. Booking another flight is last thing on my mind and using a shyster outfit such as Etihad is even further away. Even Qatar changed their policy.

      • Aston100 says:

        25 Mar25 March 13:26

        They’re all at it. Not just Etihad.

    • Zara says:

      25 Mar25 March 14:37

      Not all flights it seems. My March flights were cancelled but my April flights have not yet been. I think they are wanting people to rebook another flight instead of having the option of refunds

• WN says:

  25 Mar25 March 10:25

  Hi all,

  My BA flight to Vancouver (avios booking) has been cancelled this morning – I was due to depart on 3 April (inside 14 days)

  I’ve option to claim the full refund through BA.com. What I would be interested to know is if i can claim the EU compensation? If so – what’s the best way of doing this?

  Any help much appreciated!

  Wes

  • Kevin 9876 says:

    25 Mar25 March 10:27

    “ What I would be interested to know is if i can claim the EU compensation?“

    No. You can’t.

    • WN says:

      25 Mar25 March 10:40

      Thanks Kevin – is that recent change because of coronavirus? Thought i’d read otherwise

      • Kevin 9876 says:

        25 Mar25 March 10:42

        No, it’s because extraordinary circumstances (I can’t remember the exact phrase) mean that the airline doesn’t have to pay compensation.

        • WN says:

          25 Mar25 March 10:45

          Ok thanks Kevin.

          May still be able to claim compensation through my travel insurance?

        • Lady London says:

          25 Mar25 March 17:11

          So does anyone know, as Easyjet has cancelled flights on my bookings, can I use this to flush and get refunded all the remaining flights on those bookings.

          Unlike other airlines, Easyjet lets you put up to 12 flights on one ticket that can be rebooked,and don’t have to relate to or follow each other. That’s where my confusino comes from. It’s just that I’ve had enough of dealing with Easyjet now and cant face having to deal with every flight they are going to cancel – rather flush them now and get a refund and not have to spend the time managing all the changes..

      • Lady London says:

        25 Mar25 March 13:04

        If you mean reimbursement, then that is what travel insurance is for. Hopefully you will not have conditions on your travel insurance that exclude your situation.

      • Chrisasaurus says:

        25 Mar25 March 15:53

        It’s mostly decency and morals tbh…

        • Lady London says:

          25 Mar25 March 17:08

          Could be just a language thing. OP may only be asking about reimbursement of this oney paid out, and no more, but mistakenly using the word “compensation” which is most definitely not applicable for any flights cancelled due to coronavirus.

        • Anuj says:

          25 Mar25 March 18:46

          BA have been happy to wring money out for absolutely everything so I have absolutely no sympathy for them if someone decides to ask for compensation. The airlines collectively made their bed and now they expect us to forget they way they treated passengers.

  • J says:

    25 Mar25 March 11:54

    You’ll get a refund for the cost of your flights. Not sure why you think your travel insurance might compensate you unless you’ve incurred some loss, e.g. non-refundable hotel or hire car costs.

• SL says:

  25 Mar25 March 10:34

  Hi Rob

  I know that you travel to Dubai often. What are the taxes/fees like if travelling with Swiss/Lufthansa? Looking at using Krisflyer miles. Thanks.

  • Harry T says:

    25 Mar25 March 11:47

    If you have a KrisFlyer account, you can do a dummy booking to see how much taxes are. You don’t need to finalise a booking to check how many miles and taxes you need to pay.

    From memory of searching before, they aren’t super cheap but they aren’t as bad as BA.

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