Consumer queries: The Aer Lingus refund runaround

Liam Walsh contacted us to tell us about a refund issue he has been having with Aer Lingus. It sounds wearying. "I booked return flights to Lisbon for my family, for June 2016, on October 29th. The cost of these return flights was €615, which was debited from my credit card on November 2nd," his sorry tale starts.

On December 17th the airline contacted him to say the flight’s time was being rescheduled, but the new flight times did not suit his young family so the following day he cancelled the flights and sought a refund. “I was not told at that time that there was a 28-working-day waiting period for the refund to be applied to my credit card,” he says.

“In January, as he had not received the refund, he contacted Aer Lingus’s customer services and was told that there was a 28-working-day waiting period for the refund to be applied to his credit card. The customer services representative that I spoke to advised me to contact Aer Lingus again on February 1st if the refund had not been applied.”

It wasn’t so he did. “I contacted Aer Lingus again on February 3rd. I was advised by that customer services representative that he would escalate the issue as the 28-day waiting period had expired and that the refund would be issued and it may take my bank a few days to apply it to my credit card.

“I also asked would Aer Lingus consider offering me a goodwill gesture given the lack of a refund after the appropriate waiting period and the fact that my credit card was accruing interest on the €615 refund. He said he could not offer any gesture, but that he would send it up the line for consideration and if a gesture was to be given I would be notified by email.”

Then on February 10th, with no refund in his account, Walsh rang the airline again. “I spoke to another customer services representative and he said the request for a refund has been sent to the refunds department, but it was still being processed and he could not give me a timeline for when the refund would be issued.”

Our reader expressed his disappointment, as his credit card was still accruing interest.

“I again asked about a goodwill gesture and he said that he could not deal with this and if I wanted to seek such a gesture then I would have to fill in a customer-complaint form and submit it to Aer Lingus.

“I said that I was getting conflicting messages from himself and the other customer services representatives that I spoke to on February 3rd and that I didn’t have the time or energy to be seeking a goodwill gesture though another department.”

He has always flown with Aer Lingus and has "always found them to provide an excellent service. I've always chosen them over Ryanair when booking flights when both fly to the same city that I'm going to," he adds. But his patience has now run out.

We contacted Aer Lingus and last Thursday received this somewhat terse response: “The refund was processed yesterday and a customer service representative will be in contact with Mr Walsh to resolve the matter.”

A disputed fine for ‘fare evasion’

On December 16th Dave Hogan travelled from Sandymount to Tara Street station in Dublin and was issued with a penalty fare of €100, which he believes was unjustified. “When I went to tag on in Sandymount, I realised my Leap card was depleted, and so went to top it up at the ticket machine. However, the ticket machine was not working and seemed to be faulty. The station was unmanned, I was late for an appointment, and so I decided the best thing to do would be to board the train and seek assistance from staff at Tara in order to purchase a ticket.”

Although he sought out a staff member at Tara Street to explain the situation, he was issued with a fine for fare evasion. “I never intended to evade paying the fare and had tried repeatedly to purchase a ticket,” he writes. He appealed but it was rejected. “There is an important and broader consumer issue here, which is that there seems to be a need for an independent appeals process for penalty fares such as these [as there is in the UK].

"The revenue protection unit in Irish Rail both issue the fine and then decide on appeals. In my case, their staff member told me I should appeal and they would check their maintenance logs of the ticket machine to confirm it was faulty before cancelling the fine. They don't appear to have done this at all."

We contacted Irish Rail and a spokesman said that when there is an opportunity to purchase a ticket before travel – by either machine or ticket office – a person must have a valid ticket “and are liable to a penalty fare if you do not”. He said there were three ticket machines at Sandymount station. “One of them was out of order on the day in question, but the other two were fully operational, including one right beside the one with the fault. Therefore the fine was issued correctly, and the appeal was rejected.”

He said the appeals process was “a very factual situation – a person has a valid ticket or they do not, and there was an opportunity to purchase or there was not. Appeals are undertaken by different members of staff to those who issue the penalty.”