Virgin bumped us off flight to the U.S. and promised to refund 75% – but it’s never paid up: SALLY SORTS IT

Virgin Atlantic promised to reimburse us 75 per cent of the cost of our tickets to the US after we agreed to switch flights. 

But although the trip was last May we have yet to receive it. 

We have also not been given a refund for two bottles of vodka that we paid for on board in a special duty-free deal, but which never arrived. Can you help?

C.M., Richmond, London.

Sally Hamilton replies: You explained that you booked return business-class seats from Heathrow to Atlanta, Georgia, via Delta Air Lines through the Flight Centre travel agency at a cost of £4,919. The carrier on the day was Delta’s partner airline Virgin Atlantic.

Virgin Atlantic is yet to repay a reader a promised 75% cost of their ticket after they agreed to switch flights 

On the flight to Atlanta, you took advantage of a two-bottle deal on vodka – only to then be told there was none on board. Staff reassured you the bottles would be waiting for you on your return flight.

On your return, the flight was overbooked and you were denied boarding, which upset you greatly. 

A Virgin desk clerk said if you took a flight six hours later with Delta there would be a 75 per cent refund on your tickets. 

Although you had to cancel a business meeting for the next day, the promise of compensation softened the blow and you agreed.

The clerk took your email address and said it would be confirmed later.

You never received any confirmation and the vodka was not on your flight home because of the change of carrier.

On your return to the UK, Virgin appeared helpful at first when you chased up the promised compensation for being bumped off your booked flight but later suggested you divert your complaint to the Flight Centre. 

The Flight Centre pointed the finger back at Virgin, as did Delta. You contacted Airline Dispute Resolution, a service used by Virgin and other airlines to settle passenger gripes, but you got no reply. You then saw me as your last hope.

I know from experience that airlines flash the cash to get volunteers to give up their seats when planes are overbooked.

If no one steps forward and passengers are randomly bumped off the flight instead, statutory compensation of up to €600 should be paid on top of providing a flight if the destination is the UK or an EU airport with a British airline.

On my intervention, Virgin reopened your case. I’m pleased to say the response was suddenly full throttle and the airline changed course.

It suggested the advice you were given about reimbursement was misleading and that you would only have got the promised three quarters of your ticket price back if you had been forced to travel in economy rather than business class on your alternative flight, which wasn’t the case.

It said you were not entitled to the statutory payment of €600 each as you had taken the alternative flight voluntarily. 

But they came up with an offer you were happy to accept as it is worth more than the payment.

A spokesman says: ‘The good news is that the couple are entitled to an enhanced compensation package of either two complimentary upper-class return tickets to anywhere that Virgin Atlantic travels to or they can opt for 100,000 Virgin Points each.’ You accepted the free flights and say you are likely to use them to visit friends in America.

I couldn’t help with the missing vodka, I’m afraid, as Virgin said this was the responsibility of its third-party provider, 3Sixty Duty Free. I tried them but got no response. 

But now you have your Virgin Atlantic compensation, you say you are happy to pursue this refund on your own.

Can’t trace missing L&G pension

I am writing on behalf of my wife who is blind. She is trying to withdraw the remainder of a pension she held with Legal & General which was later passed to ReAssure. 

We have filled in various forms, sent identification in the form of a bank statement several times but either nothing happens or we get an email saying they are dealing with our enquiry and if they need any other information, they will contact us, but they never do. 

Please can you help?

M.H., Bedford.

Sally Hamilton replies: You were getting mightily frustrated by the glacial pace shown by pension provider ReAssure, part of the Phoenix Group. 

The application to cash in the pot was made in November and you expected your wife to receive the money within a few weeks, but you were so fed up you came to me for help.

I stepped in to ask what had gone wrong and soon ReAssure stepped up its efforts. Within a couple of weeks her account was credited with £10,947.98.

You were perplexed by this as the provider had originally quoted a cash-in value of £13,917 and you feared the delays had left your wife about £3,000 out of pocket. 

When I queried this with Phoenix on your behalf, it agreed that the original value was quoted at £13,917.09 but when they came to do the final calculation, the pension was found to have increased to £14,143.

The delay had in fact meant the fund had risen in value. The reason she received just £10,947 was because tax had been deducted.

Although a quarter of the pot was not taxed because current pension rules say savers can take 25 per cent of their fund tax-free, the rest incurred a charge of 20 per cent basic-rate tax.

A Phoenix spokesman says: ‘We are very sorry for the trouble and upset caused to Mr & Mrs H. 

It is evident that we have fallen short in our service here and have missed opportunities to put things right for them. 

‘We will also review where our service has failed in this instance to ensure this doesn’t happen again.’

The company also issued a goodwill payment of £1,000 to make up for your poor experience.

• Write to Sally Hamilton at Sally Sorts It, Money Mail, Northcliffe House, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT or email [email protected] — include phone number, address and a note addressed to the offending organisation giving them permission to talk to Sally Hamilton. Please do not send original documents as we cannot take responsibility for them. No legal responsibility can be accepted by the Daily Mail for answers given.