Totally gutted! Should I cancel? UPDATE - Sorted!

[2Tiggies]

I don't want to repeat my previous thread on this topic, but I have just received the verdict from Openride ...

Our booking: One adult (me) and one child (DD7)
I wanted to uprade DD from kids park ticket and Dining Plan to Adult due to her allergies to simplify things for us this time round.

After many phone calls and some emails, I have been told today that after checking several times with the management, to do this I have to not only pay in the difference between adult and child park tickets, but also all flight supplements, accommodation (already been charged as adult anyway due to single adult occupancy rules) and full air fare (already been charged unknown to me as they don't issue a full breakdown of costs in the invoice)!!

I tried to book online several times and ended up phoning becasue the website kept freezing when I tried to make the payment for my deposit. Online, DD was charged as a child for all aspects except for accommodation and it came in cheaper than on the phone but they told me unless I could get the website to take the payment (they acknowledged they have numerous problems with this on an ongoing basis) then I would have to pay as quoted. By the way, it was the exact package, also flight inclusive. Not very consistent in my opinion ......

Here are my considerations:

If I re-book accommodation only and add on my flights (exactly the same - virgin from Glasgow) separately, booking my child as a 10 year old, it will cost me around £600+ less.

Downside: I lose my £270 deposit and because we are now past the 25th November, I lose my nice baggage allowance - the whole reason I wanted to go direct from Glasgow because we always lose it with the domestic flights.

Should I address a written complaint to OpenRide? Or should I just accept that I was an idiot and suck it up?

 

[wayneg]

Sorry you haven't been able to sort it out.
Personally it would be an easy decision, I would cancel to save £600+ if I was to only forfeit £270, £330 would pay for a lot of luggage if I was to go over.
I would then write a letter to openride and tell them they have just lost a customer.
Use a cashback site(Quidco is probably easiest but there are others)to get 4.5% off your hotel/tix and if its VA I think they pay 2% cashback so claiming that would pay to the £270 loss.
Good luck whatever you decide.

 

[Elise79]

I agree with Wayne - The cost for an extra case each on the VA flights I think is something like £50 - so you will still be saving money and get exactly what you want.

BTW if you are on the dining plan and your daughter has allergies they will make her suitable meal and still one charge one child credit. They are excellent at dealing with those type of things.

 

[2Tiggies]

Thanks for the reply (and for putting up with my rant). I seemed to have come to the same conclusion as you, but since for some strange reason I have allowed this to upset me so much, I didn't want to do anything rash.

Do you just register with Quidco and can anyone do it? I will have a nosey over on their site tonight. Heard about them but knew nothing of what they did.

Actually, just thinking, the savings would pay for one way upgrade to PE for both me and DD - which would increase our luggage back to 2 pieces and add a bit of space. I always upgrade at the airport anyway, so if I pre-booked the return leg in advance .....

Would you book with OpenRide (non flight) again? It seems like the non-flight inclusive still goes through to the US and they are familiar with the tix, DDP etc. The flight inc. division seems to be being handled by Virgin Holidays now.

 

[2Tiggies]

I agree with Wayne - The cost for an extra case each on the VA flights I think is something like £50 - so you will still be saving money and get exactly what you want.

BTW if you are on the dining plan and your daughter has allergies they will make her suitable meal and still one charge one child credit. They are excellent at dealing with those type of things.

Good point.

Re. the Dining Plan, I know they are great with allergies as they have always helped us. We are doing QSDP and although they do accommodate you at the CS really well, it means waiting for food to be specially prepared which can take anything from an extra 10 to 45 minutes - that kind of defeats the purpose of the QSDP. DD has quite mature tastes and there is so much she CAN eat off the adult menu. I am just tired of trading with her for kids meals - I hate mac n cheese and don't eat PB&J either I usually end up buying extras OOP for her but since it is free dining (we never go off peak so first FD for us) it seemed more cost effective to do it this way.

I do also book a few TS every week and that is fine as they know in advance so it doesn't really take much (if any) longer to accommodate us.

 

[Neoshoegal]

You might want to consider topcashback.co.uk instead of quidco. I just booked our Disney trip with their link and not only did I get the 4.5% cashback, it also received a little top (£3.84, not much but it's a drink or 2!). Not sure why, but it's nice!

 

[Neoshoegal]

Forgot to mention. There is a way you may be able to keep most of your deposit.
Last year we booked a fly drive with Virgin Holidays, but then found a significantly better deal (due to knowing someone at Virgin Atlantic). Cancelling and losing our £270 deposit would still leave us with £100 saved, so it only made sense to cancel. However, I was a bit annoyed about having to loose £270, so I had a look at hotel only options with Virgin Holidays and basically added a few days to our holiday with that £270. I did need to pay a small amendment fee, but it did mean we didn't loose it and got a few more days at WDW out of it.
Maybe you can look at changing your booking with OpenRide to a hotel only too?

 

[wayneg]

Sounds a great idea to upgrade to PE with the saving.

I am not sure how openride/flight inclusive works, looks to me like you suggest they are run by Virgin. Hotel only direct with Disney.

Quidco is easy, they charge £5/year but it comes out of anything you earn you never actually pay it from your own money. There are others which don't charge a fee, maybe someone can suggest a better site. I use Rpoints, its free but they don't pay as much as other sites, you have to claim under their highest cashback promise, easy for me but not for a new user.

 

[Neoshoegal]

Quidco is easy, they charge £5/year but it comes out of anything you earn you never actually pay it from your own money. There are others which don't charge a fee, maybe someone can suggest a better site. I use Rpoints, its free but they don't pay as much as other sites, you have to claim under their highest cashback promise, easy for me but not for a new user.

Wayne, I used to mainly use Quidco, until I discovered topcashback. They usually have the same high cashback rates as quidco but not the £5 charge. I do tend to look at both, sometimes Quidco has the better deal, sometimes it's Topcashback. Not all companies are with both though, so it pays to check both.

 

[2Tiggies]

Thank you so much for all your advice.

Wayne, I don't actually know how Open Ride works but assumed there is some connection with VHolidays as their calls have the VH ads playing in the background, which is something fairly recent. Also they divert to VH if the lines are busy/closed.

I will look into the cashback websites and get my head around it all. If I get cash back on tix and flights, that lessens the blow of the deposit.

I was so upset this morning and since it is a surprise for DD which got spoilt last round by well-meaning excited adults I had no-one to bounce it off of either. So that meant you guys got the brunt of my rant ....

You would never think that I earn a living by organising other peoples lives, co-ordinating schedules and communication .... yet can't seem to have enough faith in myself to arrange a DIY trip !?! But I feel so much better after reading your posts and good advice. This is like group therapy - so far you guys are great

 

[Elise79]

I use Quidco - it is really simple just register on the site the click the link to the merchant and buy

I have earnt about £250 this year on things i was buying anyway

 

[2Tiggies]

Maybe you can look at changing your booking with OpenRide to a hotel only too?

I originally asked about doing that as, once it became apparent that they were completely baffled by my request, I thought it may be simpler to just convert the booking. I was told on two occasions by different people that it would entail cancelling, losing the deposit, and re-booking as Disney US handles the non flight inclusive bookings and Open Ride takes over the flight inclusive packages. I thought it would be one way to amend the problem, but there seems to be no way around it. The frustrating thing is it makes no sense at all that a 10 year old should pay adult air fare, taxes etc, just so that she can get an adult park ticket and the dining plan that goes with it and that in itself signifies that perhaps the manager to whom the request was put, does not actually fully understand what I want to do.

I will put my complaint in writing however. I wonder if I should post a caution to single parents booking flight inclusive that this is how it is done. I have always booked through a TA and the child has only ever paid as adult for accommodation, which is fair enough as I do understand and accept the reasons for this. But not on air fare and all the rest. Yet going hotel and tix only, the child still gets a reduced rate. If my error serves to help at least on other person by sparing them from going through this, then all is not lost. I would have picked up on it immediately if they actually gave a proper breakdown of charges, but they don't.

 

[2Tiggies]

After all of you not only being so patient with my little rant, but all giving good advice I just wanted to say THANK YOU

After drafting a letter to Customer Services, I decided this morning to try and insist on speaking to a superviser and give them one last chance to resolve this. I told them I have prepped a letter and am going to dispute the matter. I went in from a different angle, i.e. tried to book online, website problem, cost more by phone and took several emails and numerous requests by phone (all printed out/logged respectively) and only received a breakdown 34 days after making the booking. That meant outwith the 7 day cancellation window.

They have finally resolved it by applying a discount of £300 to my existing booking and logged it as a "fault with the website". This means that by cancelling now I would be no better off, but they have also upgraded DD to adult and I just had to pay in £60.

Bit of maths showed that I would gain less than £100 by cancelling now and the headache of having to reorganise the whole trip is a bit more than I can deal with right now.

Obviously if a better offer comes out later on, I may still cancel and re-book , but at this stage I don't forfeit my guaranteed dates which have been approved for leave from work.

I am printing this thread out for my disney vault (filing system) because all the advice is really brilliant and I will use it, if not by re-booking, on the next trip, which I will probably be planning in the next 6-8 months anyway.

Thanks again guys!

 

[wayneg]

Happy planning.
Most things can be resolved by tallking to the right person.

 

[2Tiggies]

Too true!

 

[susie2]

so pleased to hear it has all worked out for you now, i know how nerve racking it can be, i went with my son on our own when i split from my other half and it was a nightmare but we had a great time when we got there, i hope now you can start to look forward to your planning, susie

 

[natalielongstaff]

Glad you managed to resolve the situation

 

[Neoshoegal]

Yay for you! Good to hear they saw some sense

 

[2Tiggies]

Thanks everyone! It's quite bizarre though, how having a bit of support makes you feel bolder! I must admit, I took a pretty hard line with them. I'm not one to shout and scream, but I was very firm and advised them that I would be taking the matter further and opening a dispute into the ethics of the way things had been done .... and as a matter of courtesy I was calling to give them an opportunity to resolve the issue .... Seemed to work. Have to say, the staff on the phone are always lovely

Anyway, once Christmas and DD birthday are sorted and out of the way I can give some thought to proper planning. So you'll be seeing me on the boards!

 

[PChef]

Well done! So glad you got it sorted!