Five years ago in early 2020, I booked a package holiday to Orlando for myself, my husband and two friends.
We were due to travel on 6 April 2020 and I paid £4,664 upfront on my debit card.
This was cancelled due to the pandemic. Later, the company I booked it with, Teletext Holidays, went into administration.
The holiday was protected by the Travel Trust Association, but I still haven’t got the money back.
I was told in February 2023 in an email that I would receive a refund of £3,071.92 within 15 working days but it never arrived.
I understand that Teletext’s parent company Truly Travel committed to refunding all customers owed refunds by August 2021. I email and call frequently, but nothing seems to happen. C.P, Bucks
Called off: C.P’s trip to Orlando, Florida was cancelled in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic in April 2020 – but she has not been able to get the money she spent back
Helen Crane, This is Money’s consumer champion, replies: Those scary early days of the pandemic now seem very far away indeed.
I am astonished that, almost five years on, there are people who are still awaiting refunds for holidays cancelled during the first coronavirus lockdown.
You were hoping for a fairytale trip to Florida’s Orlando, the setting of Walt Disney World, Universal Studios and the Epcot theme park, but your dreams were dashed by the worldwide spread of the virus in spring 2020.
Holidaymakers who had package holidays cancelled during this time had an legal right to a refund within 14 days, as long as the trip was called off by the company organising it.
Those whose holidays could have gone ahead, but who chose not to travel because of health worries, could ask for a refund but the company didn’t have to agree. This also applied to those who contracted covid or had been told to self-isolate.
Your trip was in the former category, with the flight you were booked on being grounded and the hotel having shut down during the height of lockdown.
After you heard the bad news about your Florida trip being cancelled, Truly Travel – the company trading as Teletext Holidays, borne out of the low-fi television information service – offered a voucher for the hotel you had booked.
However, you didn’t want it because you didn’t know when the pandemic restrictions would ease, or if you’d be able to swap it for cash later on. A wise move in my view.
You asked for a cash refund instead, but none was forthcoming.
And you weren’t alone. Hundreds of customers complained to the Competition and Markets Authority, which then launched an investigation into Teletext Holidays over unpaid refunds in May 2021.
At that time it owed £7million to its customers – which it promised to repay by August of the same year. When you heard this, you were hopeful you might finally get your cash.
But Truly Travel then went into administration in December 2021, partly due to the huge weight of refunds it owed customers.
Confusingly, another unconnected firm is now trading under the Teletext Holidays name.
After the original Teletext Holidays went bust, trade organisation The Travel Trust Association (TTA) stepped in and took over responsibility for outstanding refunds.
On the advice of the TTA you asked your bank if you could do a chargeback, but this was rejected.
Chargeback claims must be made no more than 120 days after the purchase, so it sounds as if the advice you were given here was misleading.
Customers with outstanding refunds from Truly Travel which they couldn’t claim back from their bank were asked to visit the TTA website and fill out a claim form, which you did.
Two years after you booked, in February 2023, you received an email offering you £3,071.92 – £1,592 less than you paid.
Teletext: The holiday firm was initially part of the television information service, which closed in 2012. Teletext Holidays was then run as a website, before going bust in 2021. Another company then bought the rights to the Teletext Holidays brand
You disputed this, but didn’t get a reply. In any case, the money was never paid.
You had taken out travel insurance, but this usually doesn’t pay out when the tour operator has gone into administration – leaving you out of options.
That is when you contacted me. I spoke to TTA travel to try and bring an end to this refund rigmarole.
It told me that you had been incorrectly labelled in its records as having no money due to you, which is why you hadn’t been paid.
According to its files, you had raised a successful chargeback with your bank – which was not the case.
You provided the evidence of your payment to Teletext Holidays to the firm again, and I am pleased to say it has now paid you the full £4,664 you are owed.
A spokesman for TTA said: ‘C.P submitted her claim through the claims process TTA Travel implemented following the financial failure of Truly Travel in 2021.
‘Initially, she was advised to contact her bank for a chargeback, but after conversations with the bank, she confirmed a chargeback was not possible.
‘As C.P was identified in Truly Travel’s records as a ‘no balance due’ client, she was asked to provide additional information to verify her claim.
‘Based on the initial documentation that our team received, we believed that she was due a refund of £3,071.92; however, upon receiving evidence of a total payment of £4,664, we have raised payment for the full £4,664 today.’
I do have some sympathy with TTA, as it is picking up the slack for a firm that has long disappeared into the sunset – but three years between making a claim and getting your money is unacceptable.
If there is anyone else out there still waiting for money back from covid-cancelled holidays, I would love to know – helen.crane@thisismoney.co.uk.
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