It could have been a lot more!If you book flights through the Internet you may want to read this.
I’m a traveler and about a month ago I worked out that in the last four years I’ve flown slightly more than 100 thousand miles. I’m not talking about business travel here which means I have to pay, I’m not on an expense account.
For the most part I make arrangements and payments on the web; it helps when you don’t speak the language. It’s one of these occasions I want to tell you about so that perhaps the same will not befall you.
I booked a last minute flight from London to Amsterdam through ORBITZ.com two days before I was due to leave Detroit for Europe. I’ve done it a lot of times – not at Orbit.com but other more efficient and perhaps more caring travel sights. I expected the usual conformation and flight details to be in my e-mail inside 24 hours but alas, nothing so I got onto them again and discovered there was no reservation made. I was told I’d have to book again because there had been a glitch in their system so like a trusting fool I re-booked and set off on my travels. When I arrived in England I discovered the flight had been canceled by the airline British Airways and there was no record of my reservation. Stuck! And let me tell you London Gatwick is not my favorite airport.
I expect you would have felt the same as I did but to add insult to injury Orbits.com had charged me for the fare TWICE. Now I ask you; what would you do?
Here is the result, Orbitz.com refused to refund either of the charges and now refuse to acknowledge me. Three international phone calls from Spain resulted in being on hold for 40 minutes ($3 a minute). Now here’s the kicker… Did you know that if you stop a credit card payment it adversely affects your on-line buying ability?
What would you do? (Within the realms of legality)
