Travel Cards / just made a $70 mistake?
 

Any suggestions of how to resolve this (if it can be resolved)?

My daughter and I will be in London for 4 days, so I ordered four child 1-day Travelcards and four adult 1-day Travelcards. The form just asked for the start date -- there were no warnings or prompts about how to order different 1-day Travelcards for specific (different) days. I didn't know ... thought maybe they barcoded them or had some kind of way to determine how long a card had been used.

Anyhow, the cards arrived and all eight are for the same day.

I contacted Visit Britain and they say sorry, they have a no-refund, no-exchange policy, even if I go to London *before* the cards expire, with my order form in hand as proof that I'm not trying to defraud anyone. Nope, sorry. They apologize for the inconvenience. When I combed back through the online order form, I confirmed that there are no instructions about how to order different-day Travelcards. It *is* explained in the FAQs that you order one day at a time, then at Checkout click "Continue shopping" and order the next day and so on, but that information is nowhere on the order form.

So obviously at this point I wish I'd just gotten Travelcards on the spot (ironically, I was trying to save us some time standing in line), but it's too late for that now.

Any suggestions, other than to chalk this up to a $70 life lesson? Do you think it's worth trying to sell them on eBay or StubHub? They're all for Nov. 1 so there is some time ... but I don't know how credible that would look. Just trying to avoid having to pay double for something that I don't think should be such a complicated thing to resolve in the first place.

Suggestions welcome ... thanks for your help.

If you bought these outside Britain, then presumably local consumer laws apply.

But common sense would suggest that they should change them.

More importantly, though, bad publicity might shame them into sorting their act out, if you have a paper with a consumer complaints section, like:
http://www.theguardian.com/money/ser...umer-champions

That's what I thought, too ... I understand not exchanging or refunding them past their expiry date, but in my mind this is separate. Their order form is not clear, and as soon as I realized my mistake, I contacted them.

The email I got from VisitBritan said:

"Unfortunately we are unable to offer refunds on printed travel cards.

We also do not offer a replacement service for these cards once in London.

I am very sorry for the inconvenience this will cause."


I've emailed the customer service rep again, explaining that I'm not asking for a refund, I'm asking for an exchange, and alternatively I'm willing to ship them by expedited courier at my expense (with a prepaid return envelope) so they can be exchanged, if that is more agreeable.

So far no response. :-(

Nasty, I'd look on facebook for their site and describe the problem, it might drive the problem further up their level of concern. :-(

I'd try calling them assuming you have their number for customer service. A personal approach often works better than the anonymity of emails.

This was not the best way to go, it looks like a 1-week pass is less than 4 individual 1-day passes so ordering those would have prevented the problem. Also, you didn't buy from the source, Transport for London, but used a vendor (Visit Britain) who are acting as a middleman.

You could try contacting Transport for London directly, they may switch them for you. Explain that the Visit Britain shopping experience is not as clear as the Transport for London webpage.

Thanks, Tom. I started with TfL but thought, from the info on that site, that since I'm from the US I had to go through VisitBritain? In hindsight it's pretty clear I made a couple mistakes ... if I continue with no progress from VisitBritain, I'll contact TfL. Thanks.

It's just very weird to me that we could not exchange the 1-day TravelCards at any tube stop with an office, as long as we did so before the cards' expiry date and had an original receipt/proof of purchase with us. I'm not asking for money back, only for the correct product.

We'll see how this all unfolds ...

I agree with above.. Visit Britain does not refund, but perhaps ( hopefully) TfL will when they see the problem. Good luck. I think you may be lucky. I hope so, at least.

Found this on their website.. hope it works for you in person.

"Unused paper tickets
To apply for a refund for unused paper tickets, post your tickets to Customer Services with a covering letter explaining why you did not use them."

I see no reason why you should have to deal with Visit Britain rather than TfL. If they are TfL's approved agent, then TfL need to know they're getting things wrong.

Bonzai, Lincasanova -- you may have nailed it! On that same TfL page, I found this (though it only talks about 7-day Travelcards, not 1-day):

"We can also refund a Travelcard, or a Bus & Tram Pass season ticket issued on your Oyster card, or a printed season ticket. We charge an admin fee for this service.

To get a refund at a Tube station ticket office, you must bring the debit or credit card that you used to buy the tickets or pay as you go credit. The maximum cash refund value at a Tube station ticket office is £250.

Download and complete an application for refund form, attach any tickets or supporting evidence and take it to your nearest Tube station ticket office."

Thanks -- fingers crossed! Of course, it looks like we'll still be out the money for a while, but maybe with a bit of luck they could coordinate the exchange on the spot ... or refund the money and we can buy a 7-day Travelcard.

Hoping ...

Hmm you don't have printed SEASON tickets though...you have printed 1 day travel cards.

I think your best bet is to go to a ticket counter when you get here and explain to the person what happened and see what they can do for you.

My instinct would be to contact TfL by email now (there is still the issue of Visit Britain getting something wrong, which doesn't reflect well on TfL if they are using VB as an agent).

If they say no as well, then throw yourself on the mercy of the ticket clerk when you get here. No harm in trying.

Thanks, I may contact TfL.


If none of those things work, as a last resort I might contact my bank and see if they can reverse the charge. That would probably be the most direct way to handle it, especially if I surrender the tickets so there's no question of having something for nothing. Not sure how it would work with the international aspect, though.

Aarrggh I could just kick myself for trying to take care of all this ahead of time instead of waiting 'til we got to London! I was trying to save time and instead it's made a frustrating mess of this part of our trip.

Kandace

How can you dispute a legitimate charge? You made the error unfortunately so I don't see how it could be reversed.

And how can surrendering the purchased tickets work??

I really think you have two options as Patrick said above. Contact TFL now, if that doesn't work throw yourself at the mercy of the person at the ticket booth when you get here.

Technically you did buy 4 tickets to all start on the same day - how would the system know you wanted them spread over 4 days without you putting the dates in? If the start date is X and you ordered 4 I would expect them all to start on the same day.

Hopefully the person at TFL will help you out.

>>And how can surrendering the purchased tickets work??<<

If it's before the date of validity, by them tearing them up and issuing new ones for the actual dates desired. TfL won't have lost anything on the deal, and will have gained a bit of goodwill (or avoided illwill). I'm sure they have a procedure for issuing replacements for lost tickets, so it's only an accounting issue (and who cares about worrying accountants :)?)

That's exactly why I think going to the counter will work best.

But surrendering them to dispute the charges - I can't see how that would work - who would they be surrendered to?

If you ordered the London Travelcard it does give you the process for ordering the cards. You put your start date in, how many cards, etc. (which you said you did). Also states that it is one day only and if you want to use more than one day you have to order each day separately.

"Please note: For example, if you wish to have a one day travelcard for three different dates, you will need to repeat the above process three times." (quote from the travelcard website)

I believe the travelcards are date stamped for the dates you request so think you can't return/exchange them.

Here's a helpful website:

http://visitorshop.tfl.gov.uk/help-c...card-help.html

I think I would wait until you get to London and just purchase additional cards for your other dates. If you selected a start date for the cards you have, then just use the # of cards you need for that date. You would be stuck w/ the other cards/tickets but perhaps you could sell them to someone else in London for that date. At least you won't have lost all your money.

Hope this helps.

Yes, I saw that info a day or so ago, but I ordered these through Visit Britain back in August, and their order form is not that straightforward.

I guess I'll take my chances in London ... we're scheduled to arrive late on the night before the Travelcards kick in, so the next day I'll just try to find a friendly-looking customer service person first thing in the morning.

Obviously I've learned a lesson from all this, but I think I will have learned it just as well with an exchange, vs. losing $70 on the deal. It's not like these are brass plates that were custom-engraved with someone's wedding date. They're little pieces of paper with a date stamped on them. All I'd like is comparable little pieces of paper with different dates stamped on them.