Thomas Cook delaying tactics

[mooreda]

no - go to court - ABTA can be a waste of time from past experience

[TheBadTouch]

Is there a charge for involving ABTA?

[Dani]

No Abta won't charge you. But then again, they probably won't do anything! They are rubbish.

[LondonPam]

You really don't need to bother with ABTA, you are under no obligation to do so. This has been going on since last October and should have been resolved by now. You should simply issue court papers yourself and set your own timetable. Take control of the situation yourself.

[TheBadTouch]

What is Thomas Cooks history with court papers being raised - do they generally defend or concede defeat.

[heidi1]

Hi,

 

Any news on this? Sorry I dont know the statistics with TC defence of conceding!! Not much help am I!!

 

Heidi

[theonine]

Manny Fontenla-Novoa

Thomas Cook Business Park

Coninsgby Road

Peterborough

PE3 8SB

 

Mark the Manny envelope Private/Urgent/confidential etc. He's the CEO and may be interested. See what happens after that.

[Maria Theresa]

Thomas Cook are appalling. We wrote to complain on November 21st about a problem with our holiday in Luxor LAST NOVEMBER. Still NO RESPONSE. We keep phoning and being fobbed off. One is not allowed to speak to anyone in authority and each person we speak simply says we'll hear in the next week or so! We never do.

 

They did NOT follow their own 28/56 days guidelines. We heard nothing after 56 days. ABTA no help at all.

 

Reaching point of despair now. I could put details in of our very justified complaint but won't bore you!

 

We will try the CEO now, though! Thanks for advice.

[hazza68]

hi, my family of 8 went to zante in july last year and the brochure said it had 2 kids clubs, daily entertainment,movies,nightly entertainment and also it was uk exclusive hotel yet when we got there it was an eastern european hotel with hardly any british, there was 1 kids club which was foreign, the first choice entertainment staff from across the road came to play some pool games (as there was not any daytime entertainment) but was told to stop after 10 min as they got complaints from eastern europeans,they had to abandon quiz nights and bingo coz it took too long as there was to many different languages, the staff were rude. when i book an uk exclusive then i expect it and as i have a big family then we go by brochure description and most of the of the descriptions didnt exist. i complained in resort and complained back home, 1. they wrote to the independant travel agent i used when i wrote directy to them. 2, they took 3 months to send a reply,which was a fob off letter. 3. ive wrote numerous letters but they just ignore them and cant get through when i ring. i wrote to abta stating this which they advised me to send another letter which i did but they still choose to ignore me, i wrote emails which they ignore. i wrote back to abta and now ive heard nothing from them. the next step is arbitrsation but im not sure wat to do. it takes us ages to save for a holiday and we have to go by description in brochure and we booked what we thought was ideal holiday and it turned out a disaster and to top it off there was 8/9 year old eastern european girls running around the pool completely naked which made us feel totally disgusted. i will never book with thomas cook again as now the market is less competetive they dont give a damn. all i want is compensation to which i dont think is too much to ask. can any advise on the next step as i would be grateful for any advice

[akaday]

Hi, my wife and i have been going through the complaints procedure with Thomas Cook since July 2008 and are getting know where. We booked our honeymoon to Cuba with Thomas Cook and upgraded our flights. The flight it self was a nightmare. Our seats were dirty and the cabin crew were extremly rude. The hotel was falling down and all on our coach apart from one couple moved hotel after one night. And we went down a grade on the hotel we moved to.

Anyway to cut a long story short we are getting nowhere with the complants dep just get the odd letter back every now and then saying they are looking into it, then we hear nothing from them at all.

Any help would be great.

I like very much the way darrenaanderson has delt with this and would love to know more darren if you are reading this.

Thanks all.

[mustang67]

Have you looked at the " Holiday Travel Watch " site ? On there you can download complaints letters etc and there is a helpline No. 0845 017 9229

[KEMYST]

Hi Akaday.....we also complained to TC but have had no reply at all. We have sent some letters to ABTA and they have responded but said the usual 28 days....blah blah. Unfortunately we have already booked another holiday with TC before we took the one we are complaining about. Yeah, pretty stupid I know!! Anyway we have now started looking at building the package holiday myself using airlines like EasyJet and booking with the hotels directly. We did this for many years going to the USA and never had a bad holiday because you have more control over things.

Edited August 17, 2009 by KEMYST
errors

[Phimo]

I too usually plan and book my own holidays after a bad experience with Thomas Cook a few years ago when a branch manager threw a brochure at me at shouted at me, in front of a shop full of people, to read the terms and conditions of booking! I won't go into the details of why this happened but let it be known that I was not at fault.

 

Anyway, I am currently 3 and a half months into a dispute with TC and about to give up. They will not answer my letters and even the C.E.O. just passes my letters back to Customer Relations. I used TC to save 200 GBP on a cruise booking and I'm disputing the final payment date. The website, when I booked, had no terms and conditions and indicated a payment date that was changed after booking by TC. They won't listen but, they have now updated their website in line with my complaint and added Ts & Cs. They are totally useless and have lost any future business!

 

Heaven help me if I have any problems with my holiday!

[cazzashirley]

they are a bag of ****e bring back MyTravel, I have been in dispute with them for 2 years and it is going through a solicitor their customer service is terrible get onto the legal department withing the company, don't bother with customer services.

[hayleybisson]

Hi

 

Badtouch PM me and i'll send you a copy of the letters and details of my claim against them if you want.

 

Hi Darren,

 

I travelled with Thomas Cook to the Maldives last september and had an awful holiday. I have written to TC several times and am getting nowhere. They cherry pick the answers they wish to give, of which they are very unsatisfactory.

 

Would you be able to forward me your correspondence with TC as I think it will assist me with my claim.

 

Thanks

 

HB

[christine jones]

i have been waiting for almost 8 months for a reply from thomas cook. abta have sent me the reply they received from thomas cook litigation executive from their customer legal department which was packed with lies. they even said they had paid us compensation but we have not even received a letter only an ackowledgement. at the moment i have sent thomas cook the 14 day pre arbitration form so we will see if this warrants a response. i will not give up.

[Ljmcd2789]

Hi I have been trying to complain to TC now for three months, I keep getting emails from a Lady from TC asking for another copy of the original

Letter and a copy of this an that um totally fed up what can I do please??

Lisa

[Rhidian Morgan]

Hi

The only advice based on my experience is settle down for a long wait. I started my complaint back in October 2010 and after countless letters I still haven't got anywhere. TC started off by saying that they couldn't trace their copy of my Customer Relations Report (Complaint form filled at resort) and unless I could send them a copy then they wouldn't accept my claim for a refund. I finally sent them a copy and it appears that they've now gone away! What they haven't understood is how high my resolve is to get this company to own up and start taking responsibility for their failings. Why am I so driven? Take a look at what my wife and I were faced with on the second morning of our holiday after we'd asked to be moved out of the hotel that we'd been sent to and after we'd been moved out of a previous room. The resort reps couldn't understand why we were so annoyed but I take it that they've never had children. Having read some of the replies to this thread I'll perhaps take the advice of one of the members and send this photo to the Chief Executive of TC and ask how acceptible this is?

 

Thanks

[Mal Jones]

To all who have complaints about holidays (particularly Thomas Cook).

 

If the tour operator is registered with ABTA then go through the ABTA complaints procedure. This involves 3 letters to the tour operator and, if the situation isn't resolved to your satisfaction, sending copies of all correspondence to ABTA. ABTA may not be able to resolve the situation but they should at least be able to advise you as to the strength of thier case and also force the tour operator to acknowledge your complaint if they have failed to do so. If you eventually end up in court then it will be to your advantage to show that you have exhausted all other courses by going through ABTA before resorting to law.

 

ABTA offer an arbitration service to mediate between yourself and the tour operator. You are not obliged to use this service but bear in mind that if you do then you are bound by the outcome and cannot then take the matter to court. I believe that you can appeal it but you would be on shaky ground. Note that the tour operator is obliged to enter into arbitration if you choose to initiate it. The arbitration, as with any mediation, aims to reach a resolution that is acceptable to both parties and involves compromise. If you feel that your complaint is a 'black and white' issue with no middle ground then court action is possibly the way forward. In the case of the original poster there is no real 'black and white' to the situation of his holiday being spoiled by presumably rowdy rugby players. One cannot put a specific value on enjoyment so this may be an issue suitable for arbitration.

 

Don't be afraid of initiating court action through the small claims court if you don't think ABTA can resolve matters to your satisfaction. Often the tour operator will settle with you to avoid going to court and you will be negotiating from a position of strength as the clock will be ticking. If you are offered a reasonable settlement then don't let pride get in the way of practicality - the court wil take a dim view of you turning down a reasonable offer and wasting everyone's time! It is advantageous to file the action in your local court if you are a long way geographically from the defendant - they will either have to appoint a local legal firm to defend or travel down on the day or overnight. If the action is for less than £1k or so they might not think it worth the bother. The process of filing an action is pretty painless and should only cost £50 to initiate, plus another £50 or so for the hearing. Follow the procedure for submission of documents etc scrupulously as the tour operator's wily lawyer will be looking for ways to trip you up. Don't be intimidated with threats of costs etc - the court will not impose costs on either party, win or lose.

 

As with all disputes keep a journal of all actions, phone calls, who spoken to etc. Try to do everything by post or e-mail as there is a record - but be careful what you write. Send all correspondence by registered post and keep the registration slip stapled to the letter copy.

 

Good luck!