A few weeks before the partial resumption of service at Transat, some customers whose flights have been canceled because of the pandemic would like to have a little more details on the travel credit to which they are entitled, but are unable to do so.
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In order for this credit to be granted, the customer must successfully speak to someone about customer service. However, it seems that the air carrier is unable to respond to the volume of calls and emails. Joined on Saturday, Transat did not comment on the long delays to its customer service.
“We have no information about the famous travel credit. I write to them every day and when I threaten them to start legal proceedings, they do not answer me any more, “said Fred Gaudin, who has not had a response from Transat since June 25.
After a three-year stay in Quebec, the French native was to return to his family in April, when the pandemic turned everything upside down.
Transat will resume a few routes from July 23, but for Fred Gaudin, it was too late. Unemployed and having to leave his apartment in Montreal, he returned to Marseille at the end of May, spending $ 1,100 for a plane ticket with another airline.
He would therefore be entitled to a travel credit from Transat, but in reality, he would much prefer to obtain a reimbursement, which the Quebec company, like many of the carriers in the country, refuses.
“I do not wish to have travel credit, because the only available Transat flights from France go to Quebec. Knowing I’m coming back, I’m not interested, ”he said.
Mélanie Lampron would also like to get a full refund for the ticket rather than just a travel credit.
Unlike Mr. Gaudin, she managed to get a little more information on how her travel credit would apply and the airline’s first response baffled her.
“I was supposed to get married and we had reservations for a group. Transat told me that to have access to my credit, we would have to be the same group to travel together. But how do you book holidays at the same time for people who did not even know each other, especially since the wedding will finally take place in Quebec? ” rebelled the young woman from Mont-Laurier, in the Laurentians, whose group of relatives is claiming $ 30,000 in total from Transat.
Since then, Transat has adjusted its position and offers them individual travel credits. In any event, Ms. Lampron continues to demand a refund.
The reason is that if she takes the travel credit, which is valid for two years, she fears that she will not have time to use it, as Transat’s financial situation is very fragile.
The acquisition of the Quebec flagship by Air Canada, for example, may not materialize in the current context.
“When these big companies go bankrupt, they are bought out, but the debts are erased. We would lose our credits, ”worries Mélanie Lampron, who calls on governments to demand that carriers reimburse their customers in the wake of the pandemic.
The laws are much stricter within the countries of the European Union (EU). Last week, Air Canada resolved to reimburse canceled departures from the EU, but the carrier did not make the same concession for flights taking off from Canada.
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