Sent back to square one on a ticket refund — what’s next?

At what point in the ticket refund game do you say “enough”? After a year? Two years? Or is it the amount of hassle that makes you throw your hands in the air in exasperation?

Sometimes it’s a combination of time and trouble, and Mindy Farabee has both.

Last May, she applied for a ticket refund from Air France, a process that would take no more than three months, she was promised. At the end of July, she contacted the airline again to determine the status of the refund.

I have talked to three people, one of whom says he has never heard of the person helping me although he’s been in web support for years. The last person I talked to said they have no record at all of my refund request. I was given a new fax number and told to start over.

As they say in France, c’est ridicule!

The Transportation Department requires a prompt refund.

When a refund is due, the airline must forward a credit to your card company within seven business days after receiving a complete refund application; however, the credit may take a month or two to appear on your statement.

If you paid by credit card for a refundable fare and you have trouble getting a refund that you are due (e.g., you have a refundable fare, or you have a nonrefundable fare and the airline canceled your flight and you did not travel as a result), report this in writing to your credit card company.

Air France was clearly out of line. Instead of advising Farabee to start over, I contacted the carrier on her behalf. I just heard back from her.

I received an email today from Air France stating that I would receive a full refund of $1,680 for the ticket. Thank you so much for contacting Air France. I believe it “inspired” them to resolve the problem. Thank you for being an advocate for the traveler.

I’m troubled by the airline’s foot-dragging on this case — and indeed, that of the airline industry, in general. It takes only a few seconds to take the money out of our accounts for a ticket. Why make us wait months for a refund?

(Photo: Andres R Ueda/Flickr Creative Commons)

  • David Z

    Why make us wait months for a refund?

    To adjust their financial reporting?

  • Phil

    What about the interest lost on that money? Perhaps a person should consider a small court claim against the airline, yes, it would take time to do this, but if successful could “wake up” the airlines to the fact that they can’t get away with holding funds for longer than they are suppose to.

  • David H

    The longer any company can keep hold of our money, the more interest they make on it. Maybe we should be claiming interest in small claims?

    I’m sure airlines think that if they stall us long enough, or make things difficult enough, we’ll give up.

  • cjr

    Another reason to record your conversations with the company. After all, your credit card company will want proof when you go to them requesting the refund the the airline refuses to give.

  • Roberto

    The advice that a credit may take a month or two to appear on your statement is archaic. What that refers to is how before you could check your account online, if a merchant promised a credit before your cycle end date, but issued the credit right after your cycle end date, you wouldn’t see the credit on your next statement. It would appear on the statement after that.

    Now that we can check our accounts online, if a merchant promises a credit within 1-2 billing cycles, ask them how long it takes to issue the credit on their end. After that amount of time has passed, check your account online and see if it’s there. If it isn’t, call your credit card issuer and see if they can see anything on their end. If not, then it’s time to raise a ruckus.

    The problem with waiting 1-2 billing cycles is that that typically means you forfeit your chargeback rights, which expire 60 days from the date your statement is issued. Don’t fall into that trap.

  • Don

    Had an excellent experience with United. Our non-refundable flights from Dulles to Beijing In mid April were in final loading when I received notice my meetings were canceled because my colleagues flying from Europe could not attend due to the Volcano – i.e. there flights were canceled but I was flying from the US and my flight did go as scheduled. United was very helpful both at Dulles and throughout the process of requesting a refund – and I received full refund for 2 non-refundable tickets. Way to go United! Their actions have resulted in my now flying United over other carriers.

  • John Baker

    As a merchant I can give you a few reasons behind the delay. First, if a merchant makes a mistake charging your card, its an easy fix (refund or charge up to what you authorized). For a refund, its basically a one-shot deal. If I over refund you and don’t catch the error before the end of the day, I have very little recourse. In the case of a major corporation where refunds have to be reviewed and then processed, its reasonable that it make take some time (not months but a week) for the request to wind through the red tape.

    @ Roberto … Unfortunately, you are incorrect. There is a delay of days between the time I process your card (for either a charge or a refund) and the time it appears online. Since I pay a number of bills by credit card and watch our limits closely, I can tell you that it may take up to a week for a transaction to show up online (although you should see the effect in your amount of credit available almost immediately). This delay has nothing to do with me and everything to do with the credit card processors and your bank.

  • Josh

    @Chris, did Ms. Farabee contact her credit card company at any point? If not, why not (and why did you not advise her to do so)? And if so, what was their resolution/explanation for not issuing a chargeback?

    If this was a grey area case (say a non-refundable ticket the airline is refunding as a goodwill gesture), I can understand waiting, but if it’s a clear-cut case (unused refundable ticket, or cancelled non-refundable flight), the credit card company can certainly help.

    I had a double charge on an airline once, and while the airline said they were processing the refund, I contacted the card company, who removed the extra charge immediately, sent me paperwork but said to hold off on that for a couple weeks. When the airline did their end, the card company automatically reconciled and cancelled the dispute.

    Personally, I’d contact the merchant first, give them a reasonable time to do their part (a week or two at most), and then file the dispute and let the credit card company chase after them.

    And like @Don, I had a good experience with United last year — cancelled a refundable ticket and the refund appeared in my online statement the *next day*. So it certainly doesn’t have to take “3 months”.

  • LeeAnne

    There is nothing anyone could say that would convince me that this is NOT done intentionally for the purpose of attrition. The airlines know full well that at least some percentage of these refund requests will fall by the wayside if they simply don’t process them. The customers are so busy or disorganized that they don’t follow up, and enough time goes by that they forget about it, or just don’t realize that it never happened. Boom – there’s a nice chunk of money that the airline does not own, but gets to keep. Of the percentage that DO follow up, the airline makes it complicated and troublesome, passing them around to different call centers, and there’s another percentage that give up. Boom – another big chunk of undeserved money the airline gets to keep.

    What a scam. As for the Transportation Department “requiring” a prompt refund – yeah, that all sounds great, but it’s got no teeth. It’s nothing more than words on a monitor if they don’t DO anything about it.

    As usual, it takes the threat of public exposure (via Christopher) to get the airline to do what they are legally required to do to begin with.

    What a scam.

  • Blame me

    Why are you hounding just airlines in wondering why they’re slow to issue refunds? It seems that’s the way business is done today, whether it be an airline or an insurance company. Make the customer go through all sorts of junk to get the refund, but if they never raise an issue then you just got free money. Unethical? Yes. Typical? Unfortunately, Yes.

  • MarkieA

    @Blame me asks:

    Why are you hounding just airlines in wondering why they’re slow to issue refunds? It seems that’s the way business is done today, whether it be an airline or an insurance company. Make the customer go through all sorts of junk to get the refund, but if they never raise an issue then you just got free money. Unethical? Yes. Typical? Unfortunately, Yes.

    Maybe because this is a travel blog and the OP submitted a question about an airline?

  • MarkieA

    @Blame me asks:

    Why are you hounding just airlines in wondering why they’re slow to issue refunds?

    Maybe because this is a travel blog and the OP submitted a question about an airline?

  • MVFlyer

    Well, if it’s any consolation to the OP, the euro has dropped ~10% in value versus the dollar since May ’09. That means that AF, being a European company, loses money on the refund…

  • http://www.roamingtales.com Caitlin @ Roaming Tales

    This reminds me, I’m not sure that Qantas ever refunded money they promised to refund me in 2007. They kept saying “a few more months” and eventually I forgot about it. I hadn’t paid for the original ticket myself though (my employer did).

  • David Z

    @LeeAnne

    If you’re referring to airlines in general, how about Don’s and Josh’s comments? If anything, I noticed that U.S.-based carriers refund a “bit” faster than outside carriers.