There are a number of topics on the Community from people dudded by airlines while trying to use their vouchers. This might explain some it of and be helpful.
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This is just another example of why Australian consumers have the least rights or close enough to the least rights of any consumers of travel services in the First World.
Take the following extract from the US Dept of Transportation (DOT)
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Am I Entitled to a Refund?
In the following situations, consumers are entitled to a refund of the ticket price and/or associated fees.
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Cancelled Flight â A consumer is entitled to a refund if the airline cancelled a flight, regardless of the reason, and the consumer chooses not to travel.*
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Schedule Change/Significant Delay - A consumer is entitled to a refund if the airline made a significant schedule change and/or significantly delays a flight and the consumer chooses not to travel.*
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* -
DOT has not specifically defined what constitutes a âsignificant delay.â Whether you are entitled to a refund depends on many factors â including the length of the delay, the length of the flight, and your particular circumstances. DOT determines whether you are entitled to a refund following a significant delay on a case-by-case basis.* -
Class of Service Change - A consumer is entitled to a refund if the consumer was involuntarily moved to a lower class of service. For example, if the consumer purchased a first-class ticket and was downgraded to economy class due to an aircraft swap, the consumer is owed the difference in fares.*
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* -
Optional Service Fees - A consumer is entitled to a refund of fees paid for an optional service (for example, baggage fees, seat upgrades, or in-flight Wi-Fi) if the consumer was unable to use the optional service due to a flight cancellation, delay, schedule change, or a situation where the consumer was involuntarily denied boarding.*
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* -
Note: In situations where you have purchased an optional service and that amenity either does not work or is not available on the flight, you may need to notify the airline of the problem to receive a refund.*
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From my reading of what right consumers have to right airlinesâ wrongs, itâs plain as day that in Oz, airlines write the rules about what rights consumers have whereas elsewhere, consumers and law makers who are not beholden to special interest group pen the rules.
Agreed. Australia desperately needs passenger regulations and compensation scheme such as that in Europe.
Some of the behaviour of our airlines, eg leaving people stranded in some overseas destination after cancelling their flight and providing no alternative, should not be legal without significant compensation. Simply refunded (often months later) a discounted fare and leaving the poor passenger to try and find last minute super-expensive alternatives, needs to be legislated against.
And no, it isnât just mechanical, weather, or staffing reasons (looking at you Jetstar), itâs often to âoperational reasonsâ - which I suspect means the flight wasnât profitable enough. So they just dump passengers, and respond with âToughâ.
If you would like things to change, I think this is the relevant Minister
The Hon Catherine King MP contact details
Parliament Office
PO Box 6022
House of Representatives
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
Tel: [+61 2 6277 7520](tel:+61 2 6277 7520)
Email: Minister.King@mo.infrastructure.gov.au
Years ago when I worked for an airline, the Federal transport minister was usually referred to as âThe minister for Qantasâ.
Qantas is a protected company. Nothing has changed.
Agreed, but politicians wont change until they suspect there is a groundswell of public support for change (hence, email that Minister). They can change though, as we are seeing with poker machines in NSW, and the previously protected species of ClubsNSW.
Iâve encouraged the 11,000 members of the âWhy We Hate Jetstarâ Facebook page to all email that Minister to her know we have had enough!
Not sure if this is where I should post my recent brush with airline credits.
I booked a flight with Scoot (to sit up at the pointy end in Scoot Plus) and on check in, not two weeks ago, was told âthere is no Scoot Plus on the flight due to an aircraft change. Youâll be sitting in economyâ.
âGive me your telephone number and weâll refund youâ. I gave my number even though the airline had it already by virtue of my booking. No date was given as to when the refund will take place or its size.
On board the aircraft I saw indeed there was a Scoot Plus cabin. Maybe there was an aircraft change and maybe there were less seats than originally planned. So check in folk lied to me.
I was shown to the economy cabin and was the only pax downgraded.
A few days later I received an email claiming my ârequest for a refundâ Is accepted and I was offered $150 to use against a future flight. I never ârequestedâ anything. I was planning to complain two weeks later once back in Sydney and having attended to work related issues first.
I have no idea how scoot came up with the idea that $150 is fair. Frankly I expected a refund of the full price I paid and not a pro rata based on scootâs assessment of what scoot plus is worth compared to economy.
I also expected the refund to be in the manner I paid: credit card and not a voucher.
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I had a similar experience with LAN. 3 Hours late departing and missing a connection. The replacement flight had only coach seats. They gave a choice of that flight or waiting another few hours (after a cross pond) for the next flight with a premium cabin. Most of us took the coach option.
After a bit of back and forth they refunded the difference between coach and business class for the single leg, no apologies or customer recognition. It was $238 back to my card. I would have been livid if they tried giving me a voucher.
Check 4.2 and 8.3 and put it in writing
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Section 3.4 of their conditions of carriage states:
3.7 â SEAT ALLOCATION Although we will attempt to accommodate your seat reservation request, Scoot does not guarantee you any particular seat, even if you have paid for the seat, including under the âMaxYourSpaceâ seat product. We reserve the right to change your seat at any time, even after you have boarded the aircraft, for safety, security, operational or other reason at our sole discretion.
They can change a passengerâs seat allocation. Changes can occur due to less seats in class being available on a flight, combined flights where there are more ticketed passengers than seats available etc.
Looking online, the difference between Scoot standard economy and Scoot Plus is in the order of $150-160. A refund of the difference between an economy seat price and the Scoot Plus fare is reasonable. This is particularly since it appears you accepted the change and flew with them.
Looking at the terms of carriage, it appears that they offer refunds to original form of payment. While a seat downgrade refund isnât covered, it would be reasonable to request the refund to the original payment method if there arenât any additional special terms and conditions attached to the ticket (an example being a free upgrade offer subject to seat availability might be excluded from refunds).
If they accept original payment as a refund , one will need to possibly give card details to them to allow the refund to be processed.
you wrote
âA refund of the difference between an economy seat price and the Scoot Plus fare is reasonable. This is particularly since it appears you accepted the change and flew with themâ.
I am gobsmacked! What choice did I have? I asked to travel in Scoot Plus later in the day and was told âthere are no flights later in the day with seats in Scoot Plusâ. Should I have delayed my flight for days (with the chance of getting a Scoot Plus seat) and incur further hotel expenses?
As for Scoot taking pmt from my CC, they did not ask and from the email rcvd do not offer anything but a credit voucher, with T&Cs that naturally sticks it to the pax.
Itâs high time that consumers wrote the rules and not airlines. Why must AU pax have so much less rights than those in the US, EU, Israel and other jurisdictions?
Breaking News: while airlines whinge about rules that level the scales b/w them and their pax, I am unaware of a single carrier that has exited a market when such rules came into place or resisted entering a market when such rules were already in place.
I will look at the conditions but ask: why must I fight for a refund to be in the manner in which I paid? Why is it not automatic? Does choice have a list in this case of badly behaving carriers? From my reading, scoot is not the worse offender, but should be on the list in any event.
I think many consumers wish their own ârulesâ should be adopted where ever/whenever possible instead of having to follow laws legislated by parliament and established by case law. This applies across the board (road rules, taxation etc), including consumer related matters. I for one, would love all the laws/rules to suit my own interests/beliefs, but know this isnât possible as it wouldnât suit others.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) we live in Australia where we have an expectation that the laws protect its citizenâs interests, whilst balancing the interests of all affected parties. While one can argue whether or not this has been achieved at this point in time, what canât be disputed is consumers purchases and businesses are regulated by current lawsâŠand not by ârulesâ or things a consumer thinks best suits their own interests.
While one can wish for the best outcome possible, such as in this case getting a full refund/free flight when a business exercises its terms and conditions for some reason (noting these terms and conditions were agreed to at the time the ticket was purchased), this is unlikely under Australian laws as they currently exist.
I expect there would be great resistance to change existing laws so they are in full favour of consumers (or for a consumer to determine what suits themselves). If they did, I expect many consumers would take advantage of this change at expense of others.
Edit: if you believe that the conditions that allow airlines to change seat allocations is unfair and shouldnât be allowed, you can always take it up with the ACCC. It is worth noting such conditions are standard across the Australian airline industry.
Of course airlines should have the right to change aircraft or seats for various reasons. My point is that pax should be compensated beyond where they would have been if the unilateral change by the airline did not go ahead.
As for your comments on laws. I donât think the Americans or Europeans or Israelis live in legal environments that are inferior to ours. In fact I would say that the EU laws on privacy show us to be very much in the Stone Age.
The only reason why our consumer protection laws are as weak as wet lettuce is because Big Business wants it that way.
Our society will not implode if changes are made. For instance, say I want to fly SYD- LHR. Online I almost always need to pay in full when booking to secure the seat.
If I cancel, airlines be it BA QF etc often take months to refund, why? Surely they know my eTicket number so can put a stop on it so nobody else can use it. How hard is it to instruct airlines to refund in 48 hrs of it being demanded, taking any fees into account that were agreed to when the purchase was made.
In some cases they are, such as when flights are cancelled or delayed. Choice has covered these here:
Some airlines in other countries, when say they are overbooked and seats canât be allocated to some ticket holders, offer incentives for passengers to take a different flight. This scenario is different and the incentives can be generous to encourage passenger(s) to not fly on a particular flight.
While I havenât checked, it is possible that some airlines may also have refund/compensation policies when allocated seats/ticketed seat class canât be offered for a particular flight. Scoot doesnât have such a policy in their carriage terms and conditions. Possibly not surprising being a low cost/budget type airline.
While you couldnât fly in the seats you booked, under the ACL it would be considered minor since alternative option was available to allow you to fly on the same flight. It is also minor as the change made was allowed for by the terms and conditions of carriage, which were agreed to at the time the tickets were purchased.
As the purchased seats were more expensive than that used for the flight, you can reasonably ask for a refundâŠin the original payment method used to purchase the tickets. The difference in value between seat pricing is reasonable since your accepted the change when checking in. Scoot providing credits is unacceptable and you are within your rights to push for a refund in the original payment form.
It is worth noting that the difference in fare prices is reasonable, as you would not have purchased more expensive seats if you had known they couldnât be allocated for the flight in question.
In relation to additional compensation above and beyond the refund of the differences in airfares, the ACCC is very clear when they are payable. There hasnât been any information provided that meets the requirement for additional compensation.
If you believe you are entitled to additional compensation to the refund being offered, I suggest you seek legal advice to see what avenues, if any, exist for making such a claim. Members of the community canât provide legal advice relating to civil claims.
I defer to your wisdom regarding the quantum reasonableness of the $150 and see little upside in trying to fight it IF scoot refunds it in the manner I paid (which you indicate is well within my rights).
I believe that if scoot stands firm on crediting me the $150 (which compels me to fly with them again) and not refunding me, THEN I have a case. True?
That is right for the reason outlined aboveâŠ
This wording is similar to that used by the ACCC and what I would say to get the $150 refunded to your original payment method.
I would not be accepting credits as the change was made by Scoot.
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Understood. Thanks.
It also assumes that you paid the full price for the Scoot Plus seat and it wasnât part of a free upgrade promotion or a bidding process. If it was the later to, it is unlikely a request for a cash refund will be successful. These will also sit outside the Australian Consumer Law and subject to the T&Cs of the promotion.
I paid in full. That is, I booked a Scoot Plus seat from the get go.
I complained to Scoot among clear I want the refund made in the same manner as my original pmt ie CC and not a credit against a future flight, but scoot doesnât seem to be interested in complying with ACL,
SQ who manage Scootâs frequent flyer business not only ignored my email about refunding me in accordance with ACL - they maintain that a flight credit is how they refund - they have not credited me the miles I flew on that trip, claiming, get thisâŠthey âhave no record of my flightâ. This, AFTER I gave them the PNR and photos of boarding passes. SQ now demand a copy of my eTicket showing the number of the eTicket.
Breaking News SQ: Scoot did not issue me an eTicket (in the traditional sense) but a PDF with the PNR and a QR code, which of course I forwarded to SQ.
Cunning folk those Scooties.
