Any legal peeps/good complainers around who can check a letter please?

Looks fine to me. Good luck!

Are you sure this is refundable by TA and not travelmood via TA? are your booking conditions with TA? if so, i ve made some amendments below

Dear Sirs

FLIGHT NUMBERS/BOOKING REF

With reference to the above flights, due to the blockade at the aiport our flights were delayed for <number of days>

After numerous phone calls, on Monday 1st December we were told that we were confirmed on flight TG9209 from Bangkok (U-Tapao) to Frankfurt departing on Friday 5th December. Despite having flights booked to London we were informed that Thai Airways would only fly us as far as Frankfurt and that we had to make our own way from Frankfurt to London, and at our own expense.

The above demand was in breach of the terms and conditions of our contract with you. I have inserted below the relevant clauses from the terms and conditions on your website:

9.2 CANCELLATION, REROUTING, DELAYS, ETC.

9.2.2 Except as otherwise provided by the Convention, if we cancel a flight, fail to operate a flight reasonably according to the schedule, fail to stop at your destination or Stopover destination, or cause you to miss a connecting flight on which you hold a confirmed reservation, we shall, at your option, either:

9.2.2.1 carry you at the earliest opportunity on another of our scheduled services on which space is available without additional charge and, where necessary, extend the validity of your Ticket; or

9.2.2.2 within a reasonable period of time re-route you to the destination shown on your Ticket by our own services or those of another carrier, or by other mutually agreed means and class of transportation without additional charge. If the fare and charges for the revised routing are lower than what you have paid, we shall refund the difference; or

9.2.2.3 make a refund in accordance with the provisions of Article 10.2.

In addition, despite flights from Phuket and Chiang Mai being reinstated to and from U-Tapao, we were informed that the flights which we had booked and paid for from Krabi to Bangkok had been cancelled and that we were to make our own way from Krabi to Bangkok; again, at our own cost.

During this period, we also had to pay for five extra nights in a hotel in Ao Nang. We have been advised that you should have provided us with accommodation, yet you did not.

In light of of the above we request the immediate refund of the following monies:

• £384.15 – cost of 2 one-way flights from Frankfurt to London with Lufthansa, booked through BMI. I have enclosed boarding cards and e-mail confirmation as proof of cost.

• 1600 Baht or £32 – cost of 2 one-way bus tickets from Ao Nang to Bangkok. I have enclosed a copy of the booking slip as proof of cost.

• The cost of the 2 one way Krabi – Bangkok portion of the booked flights, whatever that is determined to be. I have enclosed our booking confirmation received from Travelmood.

• 8500 Baht or £170 – cost of 5 nights extra accommodation in Ao Nang whilst we were left stranded by the lack of information from Thai Airways. I have enclosed copies of the credit card receipts.

This is a total amount of £586.15, plus the cost of the flights from Krabi to Bangkok (which we will provide detail of cost when available).

The sum of £586.15 should be paid to us, by cheque, payable to <whoever> by December <whatever>

Yours faithfully,

Thanks Nick (and Melancholie). We're supposed to let Travelmood try on our behalf first but it's now Wednesday and I spoke with them first thing Monday and they have no idea how to proceed.

I'm hoping direct action will be more fruitful!

you think? arent you a teacher? i d have thought you d pick up on some of the shocking english ?

(sorry alison ?)

In my defence, I'm dosed up on diazepam, cocodemol and cuprofen at the moment. ? What did I miss?

but who is your contract with? surely its with travelmood? what's in their T&Cs?

YOUR HOLIDAY CONTRACT: Your booking is made with Travelmood Limited. When booking a holiday you guarantee that you have the authority to accept and do accept on behalf of your party the terms of these booking conditions and the booking conditions of any contract principal where we are acting as agent. It should be noted that the conditions vary slightly dependent on whether you are booking a ‘package’ or ‘other holiday arrangements’. The term ‘package’ is defined as a pre-arranged combination of at least two of: (a) transport; (b) accommodation; (c) other services not ancillary to transport or accommodation and forming a significant part of the package booked together for an inclusive price and for which full payment is made to us. All remaining products, including transport and accommodation booked at separate times or not at an inclusive price constitute ‘other travel arrangements’, which we arrange as your booking agent. Please note that different terms and conditions may apply between you and any of the airlines, hotels, tour operators involved in providing your travel arrangements. These terms and conditions will be provided to you on booking. By making this booking you agree that we may pass any information you provide on to the relevant suppliers of your travel arrangements such as airlines, hotels, transport companies etc. The information may also be provided to security or credit checking companies, public authorities such as customs/immigration if required by them, or as required by law. Additionally, where your holiday is outside the European Economic Area (EEA), you should note that controls on data protection in your destination may not be as strong as the legal requirements in this country. A contract will exist as soon as payment has been accepted and a confirmation invoice has been issued. These booking conditions form part of your contract with us. This contract and any matters arising from it are governed by English Law and we both agree to submit to the jurisdiction of the English courts.

ROUTINGS AND TIMINGS: Unless otherwise stated, the routing on your air ticket cannot be changed, once the balance has been paid. Please note that the timings of air, sea, road and rail departures are estimates only. These timings may be affected by operational difficulties, weather conditions or passenger failure to check in on time. Flight timings are subject to change as a result of airline procedures and latest available times will appear on your final itinerary. Please note that direct flights can have a scheduled stop en route. Most airlines reserve the right to alter their schedule, destination airport and type of aircraft. Such changes will not entitle you to compensation nor to cancel or change your arrangement without paying normal charges. Please also note carriers have conditions of carriage which will apply to you and which limit or exclude liability. We do not make any arrangements if there is a delay at the outbound or inbound points of departure. Most airlines however do make provisions in such cases (dependent on the length of time).

IF YOU HAVE A COMPLAINT: If you have a problem during your holiday, please inform the relevant supplier (e.g. your hotelier) so that they can endeavour to put things right. If your complaint cannot be resolved then you must contact your Travelmood branch by telephone, email or fax. If your complaint is not resolved locally, please follow this up within 28 days of your return home by writing to Customer Services at our Head Office address, giving your booking reference and all other relevant information. This will assist us to quickly to address your concerns and speed up our response to you. If you fail to do this we will have been deprived of the opportunity to investigate and rectify your complaint and this may affect your rights under this contract. It is unlikely that you will have a complaint that cannot be settled amicably between us. Disputes arising out of, or in connection with, this contract which cannot be amicably settled may be referred to arbitration, if the customer so wishes, under a special scheme arranged by the Association of British Travel Agents, and administered independently by the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators. The scheme provides for a simple and inexpensive method of arbitration on documents alone with restricted liability on you in respect of costs. Full details will be provided on request to ABTA or can be obtained from the ABTA website (www.abta.com). The scheme does not apply to claims for an amount greater than £5,000 per person, there is also a limit of £25,000 per booking. Neither does it apply to claims that are solely or mainly in respect of physical injury or illness or their consequences. The Scheme can however deal with compensation claims which include an element of minor injury or illness subject to a limit of £1,000 on the amount the arbitrator can award per person in respect of this element. The application for arbitration and Statement of Claim must be received by the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators within 9 months of the date of return from the holiday. Outside of this time limit arbitration under the Scheme may still be available if the company agrees, but the ABTA Code does not require such agreement. For injury and illness claims, you may like to use the ABTA / Chartered Institute of Arbitrators Mediation Procedure. This is a voluntary scheme and requires your tour operator to agree for mediation to go ahead. The aim is to help you resolve your dispute in a quick and cost effective way. Further details are available on request or from ABTA directly.

OUR LIABILITY (Packages only): We accept responsibility for ensuring that the travel arrangements which you book with us are supplied as described in our brochures and that the services offered reach a reasonable standard, or if you suffer personal injury, illness or death as a result of any improper performance by us of the obligations we owe you under your holiday contract, we will pay you reasonable compensation. Taking into account such factors as the cost of your package any action you could have taken to minimise the inconvenience suffered. We will not be liable for any compensation if the personal or psychological injury, illness or death does not result from any fault on our part, or on the part of our suppliers but is due to your fault or the actions of someone unconnected with your holiday, or to an unusual and unforeseen circumstance beyond our control, which neither we, nor our suppliers could have anticipated. Our liability is limited in accordance with relevant international convention. You can ask for copies of these international conventions from our office allowing 28 days for delivery. If you or any member of your party, suffer death, illness or injury whilst overseas arising out of an activity which does not form part of your package travel arrangements made with us, we shall at our discretion, offer advice, guidance and assistance to help you in resolving any claim you may have against a third party, provided we are advised of the incident within 90 days of its occurrence. Where legal action is contemplated our written consent must be obtained prior to commencement of proceedings and our consent is subject to your undertaking to assign any costs received or any benefits received under any relevant insurance policy to ourselves. Our costs in respect of the above on behalf of you and any member of your party shall not exceed £5,000.

you need to work out if your contract is with them or with TA. then you proceed. check your booking conditions on the flight tickets to see.

That's the trouble. No flight tickets - just an e-ticket.

We only booked the flights with Travelmood, so it's not a package.

The thing that complicates it is that during the delays the Thai Airways UK site said that refunds were available but if you booked through an agent then you had to go via them.

Except they're useless - they never answer calls and I've had 1 e-mail response, 2 days later, telling me customer services would be in touch, and they haven't. I called and asked for the direct line and wasn't given it.

So I was thinking that going directly might be easier.

But thats just it, you cant go direct if your contract is with travelmood, and it looks to me like it is. your letter should be addressed to travelmood, and be sent (recorded) to them. BUT, their T&Cs do say that they wont refund for matters outside their or the airlines control, and i d imagine that very much includes public disturbance. i bet if you write to TA they ll just write back and say "sorry ali, youre not a customer, so beat it"

But Travelmood were only acting as agent for Thai Airways surely?

And Thai Airways T&Cs show that they've breached them by only flying us to Frankfurt.

I will write to Travelmood, maybe copying Thai Airways as well. But I haven't received a confirmation invoice or any T&Cs from Travelmood at all - only an online itinerary that could be printed (I have hard copies) and is now no longer available online to view.

Did you have travel insurance? The airline is unlikely to offer refunds for anything that they couldn't control.

And to add, it was within the airline's control where they flew. Flights were going out - Thai Airways just chose to only fly to Frankfurt and Copenhagen within Europe. They could have flown to London as well. They managed to put on special Hajj flights for people and to all sorts of weird and wonderful other destinations but only 2 airports in Europe.

And Lufthansa customer services in Frankfurt told us for the first few days that Thai Airways had been telling Lufthansa to repatriate people to London and to claim the costs back and then just stopped it.

Had travel insurance - that's nullified due to civil unrest.

But the airline could control where it flew to - they just chose not to fly to London, only Frankfurt and Copenhagen.

Yes, but even acting as agent, their T&Cs apply, which i ve copied above, and the full set is on their website.

it would be interesting to see a lawyers perspective on this, but i think that you would have to argue with travelmood that their fending off of liability is an unreasonable contract term. it does clearly say that the airline may impose its own t&cs, and it hasnt, so to me (as a layman), i would go with the fact that you have a contract with travelmood, and that that contract has not been fulfilled, and t hey are in breach.

i doubt they could control that tbh.

being blunt, i think you dont have a great case - but i hope a lawyer can read all of this and immediately prove me wrong.

Thanks all for your input.

I checked with a solicitor friend last night. He thinks we do have a case as Travelmood are only acting as agent and there was a line in the TM booking conditions that says something about airline T&Cs and Thai Airways are in breach of their own T&Cs.

Either way, it's worth a punt and I've redrafted the letter, addressed to Travelmood and copied to Thai Airways and it's going recorded delivery today.

So we shall see.

Well I've had a bit of good news this morning. After I'd posted the letter last week I spoke with ATOL who told me I needed to speak to the Air Transport Users Council.

They have told me this morning that whilst my claims on the other costs are probably not going to be paid, Thai Airways are in breach of contract by only flying us to Frankfurt and therefore they should refund us the cost of the flights - £384.18.

The man I spoke to said if they deny the claim then I'm should go back to them with all the supporting documentation and they will pursue on my behalf.

So that's good. We always knew we were unlikely to get any of the other costs back and would just be happy to get the costs of the flights back. Hopefully this can all be sorted fairly quickly.