Rescheduling our UK trip... Since I don't think BA is going to give me my money back
 

We were supposed to go the UK, coinciding with a (now canceled) fiction conference I was supposed to attend. We did consider going anyway, but in addition to the quarantine requirement, which may or may not still be in force, we've decided that we are really not comfortable on an airplane.

We are driving to Disney World/Universal instead, and will be cautious.

Unfortunately, I had paid for airfare just before it became obvious that this pandemic was likely to become a long term issue. Our flights have not been cancelled, and I don't think they are going to be. I'm probably going to hold out for another week or two, before I call them, but I think I'm going to have to take a voucher.

Right now I'm thinking May/early June of '21, for reasonably good weather etc. I like traveling around Christmas, but I think we may still be having issues with the pandemic, and my husband doesn't always share my enthusiasm. He also does not want DS and myself nipping over for a quick shopping trip in the winter if I can get a really cheap fare.

I'd rather get a refund, since there's a fair amount of money involved (and just revisit it all at some point next year when the world is hopefully more sane) but I don't think it's possible. I can mention the canceled event, which I can document, but I don't think that's sufficient.

Latest good news is a 50% chance of a Vaccine from Oxford in September and enough vaccines in the pipeline to clear the UK by Jan 2021.

depending on your view that 50% is either fast or slow, but I would not try and be here before Jan 2021

It depends on your contract and what you bought. If it were part of a holiday booked directly or just a flight or paid for with credit cards your chances of getting money back are different, good luck, get your facts together and start asking, there is a queue and not that many people processing the deals so get in early.

Late May, Early June can be lovely. Today 12C and raining.

You could just wait to see if your flight is cancelled. If you are sure you cannot get a refund and will take a voucher, why not wait? The voucher will be there even if you wait some weeks. If you take it now, your chance for a refund for a cancelled flight is gone. If there is one thing I have learned since this mayhem started, it is to be patient...

Yeah, what rialtogrl said. BA cancelled our July flights at the end of May so maybe you won't have too much longer to wait.

I don't even understand your dilemma. You aren't entitled to a refund, you bought the ticket and agreed to those terms. I agree that cancelling now doesn't get you anywhere, anyway. I didn't even see any dates you are talking about but if they are dates when Americans are allowed into UK and the flight is running, you obviously aren't entitled to anything unusual in terms of refunds. Normal terms are a "voucher" which is just a credit on your account to use later, but then you would have a hefty change fee. At least most airlines do, like $200 or so. Still obviously not that bad a deal as a cost to do whatever you want and keep the money to use later. I'm not understanding what the issue is. You obviously can afford to pay a change fee since you talk about going to London just to spend money on a shopping trip.

If you want to go next year anyway to use the funds, I don't see a problem. The funds just need to be used within a year of purchase to buy a ticket, I believe, not necessarily the flight dates. Some flights are never going to be cancelled just because of Americans. After all, that is a British company, plenty of people are actually allowed to fly there from the US, if they are British citizens. But doesn't sound like you need to do anything right now anyway as you don't get any advantage to cancelling yourself earlier than just before the flight. At least you don't on any airline I fly.

Fl numbers were up 2000 yesterday. Wasn't your trip in September? You have to wait for them to cancel and then you should get a voucher or refund.

Airlines BA and others are cancelling flights almost week by week....many factors but they are not in the business of flying empty planes....they will maybe operate one or two weekly...or whatever...so you will have an excellent chance of that flight canceling. UK and US are doing very poorly in terms of number of cases despite the fact that they are "opening" up. Let them cancel and if they do not most airlines are not imposing any cancel/change fees and will issue the credit for future travel...some are allowing longer than one year given the crisis. Nothing "normal" about what is happening right now so keep watching and remember they often to not contact you immediately when the flight is changed or cancelled...they take their time...up to you to monitor...also if for example it is a major change you can cancel and get full refund...they fly into US and must abide by our rules. Good luck.

Might your conference be rescheduled for next year?

BA is pretty good about notifying people about cancellations. I was suppose to fly in early August and up until a couple of days ago, they were only offering vouchers through July 31. Now it has changed to August 31. The voucher is good through April 2022. My flights are not cancelled yet, but I can still take the voucher if I do not want to fly, I am happy with that.

If you can't get a refund (as you seem to assume) and are getting a voucher, I agree with those who say what's your hurry.

You say you don't "think" the cancelled event will be sufficient for a refund, but it doesn't sound like you have asked yet?

I haven't yet asked BA if my event cancellation is sufficent, which will be my first strategy, assuming the flight(s) are not cancelled. As of last time I checked, they were not showing cancelled, it would still be possible to book them, and when I looked at sooner dates, it looked like all segments were go at least most of the time. We were originally supposed to fly out on 8/28 and back on 9/12. I would prefer to have things settled, but I can wait a bit longer to see if one or more segments get cancelled (PHL to BWI, BWI to LHR, Lhr to PHL).

There is no change fee under the terms I bought the tickets under, which was right before things really started to look dicey. I would not be in favor of tossing money around randomly anyway, and the theoretical shopping trip, while obviously not free, would have involved partial use of the voucher (with the rest buying three new tickets, or most of three new tickets) and our normal Christmas (or post Christmas) shopping, just in another country.

My event is being rescheduled to next year (it's normally bi-annual) but I'm not sure I want to try to shoot for it. They refunded most of my entry fees, so I'm not prepaid.

On their website, they state that vouchers can be requested for bookings made before March 3rd this year and for travel between March 14 and 31 August 2020. Does your trip fall into this category, if so you need to call BA to request a voucher. If not, I doubt an event cancellation would be sufficient grounds for BA to refund tickets on non refundable flights but it is always worth asking. Alot of airlines are restarting their flights slowly with limited schedules, so there might not be cancellations for September.

Yes, we fall into that category.

I'll probably call them fairly soon (early July, most likely), and see what they'll do for me. We do want to take that trip, but it's annoying having the money tied up, and since I'd gotten a really good business class fare outbound (which is a trick I may not be able to repeat), those were unusually expensive tickets for us.

Our flight is cancelled!

I did wait, and now I'm very glad.We're going to call them this afternoon and see if we can get that taken care of.

We're still planning Disney, despite Florida's increasing numbers (although planning Disney has been frustrating, since their policies are even more Byzantine than usual).

I'm assuming they'll refund me the whole thing, not just the canceled segment (which is far and away the most expensive, since it's the one with the businesss class tickets).

Yay! I saw a thread on flyertalk about August cancellations for BA and almost linked it here... glad your patience paid off. Specify to customer service that you want the entire thing cancelled, not just that segment. And it might take quite a while for the credit to show up on your credit card.

Do you think Disney will be open?

Well, they're planning to be.

It is of course possible that they'll decide to either shut again or delay opening, but they seem to be proceeding ahead with their Florida plans.

I can't imagine that DeSantis is going to shut them down unlesss they decide to do so themselves. I've been watching videos of Disney Springs and the resort re-openings and while nothing is fool proof, I'm pretty comfortable with their procedures. I'm also comfortable driving with my own family in my own car, and we'll be careful about stops and mask. We'll be particularly careful about stops in states where masks are not mandatory.

So for now, we're planning on going. If Disney decided to shut again, I'm sure they'll give me my money back.

crikey, going to Florida is pretty brave

Well, we're going to be careful, and while we don't know, we think we've had Covid/been exposed already, due to various circumstances. It might be time to seek out antibody testing, although I keep seeing that you shouldn't change your behavior even if you have antibodies. I'm also sort of hoping their current outbreak has subsided a bit by the time we get there.

I live in Fl and dreading the trip to my husband's Doctor on Tuesday in Winter Park. They take you temp and you must wear a mask but think I will sit in the car and run in and out of Trader Joes. He has to go as follow up to surgery. So many places have closed down due to covid employees after just reopening. That is tough as they have once again restocked food and kegs. Trader Joes does not even let you bring in your own bags. I will go get the link for you to keep track of Fl. Glad you are getting your money back. We have not from Virgin Atlantic, Air France did refund last week but waiting still for Virgin fight.https://experience.arcgis.com/experi...1c643c195314e/ Give it time to load and at the top, you pick your county. Disney is Osceola County.