Virgin Australia overcharged me $4500

[JohnK]

Good to see that it has worked out for you.

 

[straitman]

Hi folks

Virgin Australia came to the party, finally, today, and refunded me the amount + the credit card interest.

Relieved they came through.

Anyway, in answer to some people's questions/comments:

• I didn't want to charge back via my credit card, since VA informed me that my Velocity account would be terminated upon a chargeback. I wanted to try and resolve this via diplomatic channels, whereas I normally wouldn't hesitate to run a chargeback on a vendor. I value my VA account.
• The blanked out bits of the original message were largely irrelevant details about the upgrade I requested.
• I agree the upgrade $ offer I made was low, but they had repeatedly told me it was on sale, and I have no reason to assume their system is broken. It made an offer in good faith, which the system seems to have accepted.

Cheers
Paris

I'm very happy for you that you have have the right solution and that Virgin have come to the party.

The one strike policy for chargebacks is of concern and I believe will cost them money from those who know about it.

Whether you blank out sections of your post or not is a personal decision. Some will agree and some will disagree like everything else in life. As mentioned I would blank-out the irrelevant or personal bits as ultimately it has not affected the outcome and people have tried to help you despite a few having doubts.

I hope we see you here some more as there is plenty of good information to be had.

 

[N860CR]

For interests sake, was the person you first spoke to (who sent the document you posted) in Australia or the Philippines?

VA and VAA seem to have outsourced a lot to Manila and my experience is that the staff there will simply straight out lie to try to get rid of you. I'd be curious to see if somebody in the Brisbane office actually sent that document

 

[nlagalle]

After reading this it makes me glad I don’t deal with VA anymore!

 

[mannej]

After reading this it makes me glad I don’t deal with VA anymore!

I have a feeling there is a pool of people who feel the same way

 

[Jack_OC]

Sorry opusman but I disagree with you on this.

IMHO cutting out all the extra waffle is appropriate and useful. Maybe a brief explanation would be useful however I am not convinced that it is really required either.

Cutting out all the extra waffle may well be appropriate and useful. However, he didn't cut out all the irrelevant details. He left in details such as a reference number, his surname, and a fair bit of completely meaningless waffle, such as "Thank you for your time on the phone today" and "If you have any questions, do not hesitate to let me know". That strongly suggests that the editing had nothing to do with brevity.

Furthermore, the redacted paragraph immediately precedes the words "Therefore, while we appreciate your request for a refund of the overcharged amount, a refund of this will not be forthcoming". Since the word "therefore" directly refers to the redacted paragraph, this makes it obvious that the redacted paragraph contains VA's justification for their refusal to provide a refund.

TBH, I wouldn't have much trouble imagining that VA's justification is spurious, but the OP seems to have gone out of his way to prevent us from seeing the explanation that VA offered. Why? If the redacted paragraph was just irrelevant waffle, what would the OP lose by allowing the rest of us to see it? In any case, it certainly can't be more irrelevant than most of the text that he chose not to redact.

One other comment - if this story is genuine, then the OP is very easily identified from the details provided. He was apparently worried that he might have his Velocity membership cancelled if he simply initiated a chargeback (which would have been a perfectly reasonable thing to do if VA did what he alleged). However, he is apparently not worried about what VA might do after he alleged on a public forum that VA "stole" a large amount of money from him, using a selectively edited version of their email to him as "evidence". Very, very strange.

 

[SOPOOR]

assuming we've heard the whole story,

overcharging, acknowedging the error, not refunding, threatening to cancel membership

a total loss for words

that is beyond low life

 

[mannej]

assuming we've heard the whole story,

Not a great assumption to make considering we have only heard one side out of the 3 sides to this story.

 

[RooFlyer]

Some people are just not happy unless they can cast someone complaining about an airline in an unfavourable light.

If the OP just wanted to pour scorn on the airline ... give 'one side of the story' ... they needn't have reported back that the airline has responded to their satisfaction.

Its been the case ever since I've been here that newbies aren't conversant with all the 'etiquette' of disclosure / explanation / erasure of personal details on the forum. Give the OP a break! It might encourage them to stick around and hopefully 'give back'.

 

[straitman]

Not a great assumption to make considering we have only heard one side out of the 3 sides to this story.

Unfortunately we can and will never know the second and third perspectives of the story.

What is cut out is VERY subjective. I guarantee if I gave you all the info that you would cut out a different section and amount to the next person. What I see as important or unimportant and would leave in or cut out could/will be very different to most other people. I also guarantee that this would be across the board.

 

[Jack_OC]

Some people are just not happy unless they can cast someone complaining about an airline in an unfavourable light.

IMHO, the OP casts himself in an unfavourable light by inexplicably redacting the key paragraph in the email from VA.
​

Unfortunately we can and will never know the second and third perspectives of the story.

What is cut out is VERY subjective. I guarantee if I gave you all the info that you would cut out a different section and amount to the next person. What I see as important or unimportant and would leave in or cut out could/will be very different to most other people. I also guarantee that this would be across the board.

He redacted the paragraph in which VA explained/justified the reasons behind their refusal to offer a refund. That's not a subjective assessment - it's blatantly obvious from the text that remains. The redacted version of the email is completely uninterpretable because of this.

He did not redact any other part of the email - not even his own name or the name of the VA staff member who sent him the email. If people decide to redact anything, they generally start with personally identifying information. I'm also struggling to understand how any "details about the upgrade" could be considered to be "irrelevant" to this complaint. The entire complaint centres around the details of the upgrade request!!

There is a very easy way for the OP to put this mystery to bed. If he chooses not to, then I will continue to assume that there is something important about this story that he doesn't want us to know.

 

[djchuckles]

Not a great assumption to make considering we have only heard one side out of the 3 sides to this story.

assuming we've heard the whole story,

overcharging, acknowedging the error, not refunding, threatening to cancel membership

a total loss for words

that is beyond low life

Yep - only hearing part of one side of the story we'll never know - and to be fair makes this thread irrelevant - though I see AFF are now using it as clickbait.....

 

[Ex-bugman]

I had a similar incident of overcharging but it also included a wrong set of flight dates last Dec. The VA responders were Manila based, I escalated it to a Senior Manager, who was very helpful but it still took 10 days to fix and not before I was threatened by the Manila staff of having my VA FF status and membership revoked. VA are just an unfortunate standby carrier for us now.

 

[RooFlyer]

IMHO, the OP casts himself in an unfavourable light by inexplicably redacting the key paragraph in the email
<snip>​

There is a very easy way for the OP to put this mystery to bed. If he chooses not to, then I will continue to assume that there is something important about this story that he doesn't want us to know.

Pro tip 1: If it's a choice between a conspiracy and a stuff-up, choose the stuff up in the absence of evidence to the contrary

Yep - only hearing part of one side of the story we'll never know - and to be fair makes this thread irrelevant - though I see AFF are now using it as clickbait.....

And jolly well clicked, sir!

Pro tip 2: Beware the grassy knoll.

 

[theblank]

before I was threatened by the Manila staff of having my VA FF status and membership revoked. VA are just an unfortunate standby carrier for us now.

there is no way a first level call centre operator would 'threaten' this, its not even their call to make, nor would they have any input into it, and they have nothing to gain by doing so. More likely they would have just warned of the possible outcome if a chargeback was undertaken by the customer, and from VAs point of view, they are justified in doing so.

 

[Jack_OC]

Pro tip 1: If it's a choice between a conspiracy and a stuff-up, choose the stuff up in the absence of evidence to the contrary

Certainly not suggesting a "conspiracy". I'm suggesting that one party to a dispute has provided a somewhat incomplete account of said dispute - something that happens very often IME.

Pro tip: before reaching a conclusion, make an effort to hear both sides of the story. Especially when one party goes out of their way to stop you hearing the other side.

 

[ajobbins]

So VA initially refused a refund, but on what basis? This is what seems to be missing from the story, and may be what is covered in the redacted paragraph.

If this were me, that is the question I would be pursing with VA. WHY are you refusing the refund? There HAS to be some justification for the (initial) refusal. It has to be the justification for the refusal that you fight, otherwise what are you fighting? Seems odd this is missing.

 

[straitman]

Pro tip: before reaching a conclusion, make an effort to hear both sides of the story. Especially when one party goes out of their way to stop you hearing the other side.

Where possible it actually needs to be looked at from three perspectives.

If one side offers all they consider relevant and the other offers no information you can only assess your response from that. (That's not stopping you hearing' anything.)

 

[Dr Paris]

Hi folks

You're a paranoid bunch, aren't you?

Thanks for chipping in your opinions, it's been a while since I've been on a forum of any sort, and I forgot how lively it gets

Anyway, the missing paragraph was as follows:

Dear Dr. Buttfield-Addison,


Thank you for your time on the phone today.


As advised, after retrieving all data from our upgrade system as well as reviewing the confirmation emails that were emailed to you upon receiving your offer as well as the confirmation email sent to you once the bidding window had closed and your offer was accepted, we have confirmed that the charges made were charged correctly.


Therefore whilst we appreciate your request for a refund of the overcharged amount, a refund of this will not be forthcoming


I appreciate that you remain disappointed and frustrated with the outcome and apologise once again.


As mentioned, if you wish to escalate the matter, it is your prerogative to do so and if you may escalate the matter outside the airline via an external body.


If you have any questions, do not hesitate to let me know.





Kind regards,

Largely irrelevant, as I said, but I appreciate your interest in knowing the whole story! I'm not 100% sure why I redacted that bit of the email in hindsight, but I'm sure I had a reason!

Their argument initially was that nothing could have possibly gone wrong with their backend systems: it took conversations with two seemingly very senior VA people—Florian, and Annettte—before they conceded that it was possible something went wrong on the backend.

They initially wanted to wait days/weeks for their upgrade vendor (who is apparently NYC-based) to get back to them, before they refunded me, but I argued that the correct customer service action was to make it right with the customer before waiting for their investigation to complete. It made no sense to me why they became so hostile initially, and refused refunds, while simultaneously admitting it was overcharged but refusing to say it was a mistake.

Florian and Annette agreed with me, paid me the refund via bank transfer on the same day, and that was the end of that. Florian agreed it was a customer service lesson for them, and agreed to update me when their upgrade vendor got back to them so I could have some non-monetary closure as well.

The people who threatened with closing my VFF membership were from VA, not VFF, and had strong Australian accents. I only started to get any form of traction on VA fixing this when I started getting loud on Twitter (Dr Paris (@parisba) | Twitter).

As for redacting bits of the email, but not my names -- all my information is online, I am a very public person with my name/phone/etc.

Cheers
Paris

 

[pauly7]

Would be great to get an official response from VA on the ‘chargeback and your Velocity account gets erased’ threat...