Pricey Vacation TROUBLESHOOTER: I not long ago booked two coach tickets from Seville, Spain, to Madrid from Trainline, a ticket reseller. The tickets are 70% refundable.
I essential to improve to an earlier teach but couldn’t do it on line. So, I bought two new tickets for vacation and have sought a refund for the tickets I could not use. I tried out to chat to client provider initial in Seville and then Madrid. A consultant advised me to submit my ask for on the internet.
I followed all the guidelines on the internet site. Trainline has suggested that I’m entitled to a refund. But now it is stating the exchange is unattainable unless of course I send out a screenshot of the mistake concept I obtained, with a timestamp, when hoping to cancel my ticket. Can you assistance me?
— Linda Shapiro, Chicago
Remedy: Trainline’s tickets are refundable, but like airways, you have to terminate right before the practice leaves. Trainline says it has no file of you seeking to terminate, so it is going to continue to keep all your revenue.
But here’s the issue: Though Trainline said it can procedure a ticket improve request by way of its web-site, you could not do it. This is a frequent challenge with vacation organizations. They direct you to their sites for the “best” purchaser services, but then present you very little but useless ends and mistake messages.
If I didn’t know any greater, I’d say providers generate web-sites to turn people absent — and make it possible for them to hold your money. But in this case, it was possibly an situation with your browser accessing a European site or something benign. In some cases, these points just happen.Trainline’s terms and situations, which you can locate on its web page at thetrainline.com, are distinct about the timeline for canceling your tickets.
I feel if you experienced one thing in writing that shows you tried to terminate your tickets on time, you could have obtained the 70% refund. But you did not have any evidence, which made your case extra intricate.
The following time you have to cancel a thing in advance of your departure or stay, remember to make sure you have anything — an email, a printout, a cancellation quantity — that displays you contacted the corporation before your deadline for a refund.
I attained out to Trainline on your behalf. It reviewed your documents and confirmed that it denied your refund mainly because you experienced not canceled your tickets by way of your Trainline account. “She contacted us so we can aid her get a refund of these two tickets considering that she did not control to trade them at the station,” a agent claimed.
Trainline says it resolved to make “an extraordinary refund” and has honored the 70% refund.
Christopher Elliott is the chief advocacy officer of Elliott Advocacy, a nonprofit business that can help consumers resolve their issues. Elliott’s hottest e book is “How To Be The World’s Smartest Traveler” (National Geographic). Make contact with him at elliott.org/aid or [email protected].