small claims court for travel website (orbitz)
 

Does anyone have any resources, experience, or information on what to do when you are getting royally screwed by a travel booking company?

Just returned from a 2 week trip to UAE and then India yesterday. My husband and I booked the flights on November 30th and purchased trip insurance at time of booking. While in Dubai I got major food poisoning and had to go to the hospital which made us miss our flight from Dubai to Delhi. We had to reschedule it to the following day which cost $1500. There was no other option and we figured with travel insurance we would recover at least some of the hit. My husband tried filing a claim while still in Dubai but had trouble with it. Didn't have the ability to make a phone call so we decided to pursue it full on when we returned to USA yesterday. Allianz (our travel insurance) had no record of us purchasing insurance. We had a confirmation email from Orbitz with the travel insurance number so we were confused. We called Orbitz who happily gave us the same travel insurance number again and confirmed they had a record of the insurance confirmation. After pursuing it longer it turned out that at time of booking, Orbitz somehow did not actually charge our credit card for the insurance and never purchased it from Allianz.

Orbitz is not taking responsibility for this AT ALL and is only offering us a $200 voucher for future travel for the "inconvenience". They also claim that the tickets were purchased too long ago and they can't do an IT investigation to see what went wrong (The tickets were purchased less than 4 months ago!). I guess our only option is to take them to small claims? I'm blown away by the lack of customer service.

Any advice or insight?

See if you can get Chris Elliott to help: www.elliott.org

I would suggest that your read Orbitz's Terms of Use, available on their website. Note that by using their services you have consented to arbitration for resolution of any dispute. Whether that clause us binding is perhaps debatable, but I would expect Orbitz to resist any judicial proceeding. That said, I'd pursue their formal dispute process and see what happens.

Even if you were able to proceed in court and even if you got a judgment, collecting it is never as easy or straight forward as one would think. Few judgment debtors in my experience just willingly pay a judgment. You'd quickly be out of your depth with a company this size without hiring an attorney--and the amount you're out of pocket is arguably not worth hiring one IMO.

This probably goes without saying, but next time obtain trip insurance on your own.

Also please check your cc statement to be sure you see a charge.

Sorry for this and I hope had coverage for the hospital stay.

Try this too.
http://abcnews.go.com/blotter/fixer

Good luck!

All good advice. Thanks for writing about your problem. It can help others, and I hope you can get it resolved appropriately.

Nothing like the possibility of bad pub nationally to "convince" them to alter their position. :S-.

Post your complaint on their Facebook page. That seems to get a company's attention.

Even if you were able to proceed in court and even if you got a judgment, collecting it is never as easy or straight forward as one would think.

Thanks for all the responses everyone. One of their supervisors ended up contacting me and asking to see receipts for the costs we had to incur with our trip interruption. She also said they would do an investigation to figure out what happened. That's good news (and a much better response from the company that we initially got). After submitting all our receipts, they emailed us saying we would get an update in 5 days. I have no idea what to expect but feeling a tad more hopeful.

Good luck. Do you mind keeping us updated?

Thank you.

Larry. :).

Good luck! Keep us posted.

I will definitely update when I hear from them next. Eager to know how this will play out - $2100 is a big loss!

($2100 was total after flight change and hospital fees).

>Even if you were able to proceed in court and even if you got a judgment, collecting it is never as easy or straight forward as one would think.

Not easy but fairly straight forward. I recall a case in FLorida a few years ago where a person won a judgement and it never got paid. Until a friend, who was also a cop, easily got the paperwork and they went down to the airline's local office and shut it down by seizing computers and furniture. They kindly held off as the manager got permission to cut a check right then.

Did they not charge your credit card for the insurance? I can see how that might have flown under your radar, especially if it was bundled with the airfares, but I would imagine if they didn't actually charge you, there could be a snag in collecting anything from them.

Not that I would be doing anything less than you are if it were me! I think Orbitz has a clear obligation to pay up - since apparently they gave you a confirmation.

Hopefully Orbitz will step up to the plate and take at least *some* responsibility. Hoping your update will be a positive one!

NoFlyZone, maybe that would work under Florida law (which is in many respects atypical) but it's not the norm for any of the states I've done creditor's right work in or had to examine for purposes of my current job. Seizure and garnishment can be arduous. But the bigger stopper here is the arbitration clause in Orbirz's terms of use.

As I understand it, the broker/agent (Orbitz) told you that you had a contract, and even gave you a reference number for same.

But for whatever reason, there exists no record of payment. In these situations, do not get distracted by policy numbers or what the broker says - follow the money. Next time, check your CC statements regularly after you make an on-line purchase. Because with no consideration - no money paid - you had no contract with the supplier (the insurance company) - no matter what the dolts at Orbitz told you.

Now comes the hard part. Given that you had engaged Orbitz as a broker, it was their job to transmit your CC details to the supplier. Why was the payment not processed? There could be various explanations.

I wish you well, let us know what happened.

Scdreamer - correct. I confirmed purchase for two flights to India with an extended stop over in Dubai plus travel insurance but somehow was only charged for flights and not the insurance. It was very easy to not catch this on our credit card because the tickets were over $2000 and the insurance was only $150. When I got the confirmation number and an email saying "status: purchased" I didn't even think to double check. Of course one always buys this stuff hoping they never have to actually use it anyway!

Still no word from Orbitz but it's been 4 days and they said they would contact me again in 5-7.

I guess I'm confused on why a company like Orbitz would even exist if they can't book your travel needs correctly. Otherwise I would just book everything separately and confirm it all myself! Im assuming there was a glitch in the system somewhere but if so, they should own up to it and refund us. We will now never have the opportunity to file with insurance which is really unfair.
Not to mention - is this happening with other customers? They need to really check their processing.

>Given that you had engaged Orbitz as a broker

Just to clarify, and to show exactly where the agent stands in the transaction, the agent almost always works for the airline, hotel, tour company, etc. They sell the airline's product and are paid by the airline (although some now attach a "planning fee" or similar to supplement that income). They basically are legally required to follow the rules set up by the airline. Agency Law governs the transaction. In the travel business the term broker is rarely used, and when so it is synonymous with agent.

There are a tiny number of times when one can engage the agent to be "yours." Their compensation is determined by explicit contract and then you can govern their behavior. And, I believe, they cannot take commissions from suppliers.

Still no word from Orbitz. It's been 11 days since they said they would contact us in 5-7 days...