Pricey Travel TROUBLESHOOTER: Past calendar year, I compensated $1,284 for two tickets from San Francisco to Barcelona, Spain. The day in advance of our flight, I tried to print our boarding passes. I could not.
We went to the airport three hrs early. Even nevertheless I supplied the airline’s agent with the confirmed itinerary, they could not obtain it. To get on our flight, we compensated a further $1,973. It took pretty much three several hours to get us reticketed, and we practically skipped our flight.
Stage Airways will not refund the $1,973 for the reason that it states we had been a “no show” for the flight. How can we perhaps be a no-present if we were being on the flight? Moreover, we paid out 2 times for the flight.
I called my credit rating card company and a representative proposed that I dispute the first purchase. I did, but my credit card sided with the airline. Can you aid me get my $1,973 back again?
— Ellen Boelens, Redwood Metropolis, Calif.
Answer: Stage Airlines, a discount airline run by Iberia, really should have had a file of your flight. You bought your tickets by way of its internet site and tried using to validate your reservations on line a day in advance of your departure. You also arrived at the airport early to try out to type points out. Rather, Level marked you as a “no-show” and then sold you new seats at a $689 markup. That is completely wrong.
You may perhaps have discovered a less pricey fare on yet another airline, but I think it was intelligent to rebook on Degree Airlines. That way, the airline knew for certain that you paid out for your tickets 2 times. You in fact had been on your originally scheduled flight, so you couldn’t have maybe been a “no-clearly show.”
Though your flight took spot before the pandemic, you tried using to take care of it during the pandemic — and that was the dilemma. Stage Airlines, like each individual other airline in the globe, was overrun with refund requests. Yours was a person of hundreds of hundreds of them.
As I reviewed your paper path — great position on retaining that, by the way! — I saw no evidence that you ended up a “no-present.” This was just an electronic glitch that Level Airlines pinned on you. And it seemed all as well satisfied to allow you pay back for your ticket two times. That is how airlines make their money these days. Preposterous.
You could have appealed this double cost to a single of the airline’s executive contacts. I publish the names, numbers and e-mail addresses of Iberia’s professionals on my consumer advocacy web site at www.elliott.org/corporation-contacts/iberia-airlines/.
I contacted Iberia on your behalf quite a few situations, but the airline would not refund your ticket. Lastly, you contacted the U.S. Department of Transportation and filed a criticism. Iberia refunded your 1st flight, leaving you to spend the $689 change. You are nonetheless content to have acquired a little something back from the airline.
