Funjets Cancels Charter Flight into Coz till Oct 1 2005

[Bill51]

According to Funjet’s website they will refund all money for canceled flights within 14 days. That sounds reasonable.

 

[OWSIinAustin]

Thats not what I was told but Ill start the clock. I'd rather have my flight

 

[OWSIinAustin]

Thats not what I was told but Ill start the clock. I'd rather have my flight

Looks like Funjet has updated its policies http://www.funjet.com//specials/hurricane.asp

 

[sharky60]

Guys and Gals,

In case you didn't know Funjet has canceled all flights into Cozumel unitil October 1st 2005. .....Chris

I just read this and got big knot in the pit of my stomach! The charter flights are the only way some folks can afford to go down there! Flying American is great but you pay sooooooooooooo much more than the charters and personally I'm not interested in going through Cancun, been there, done that, and didn't like it one bit! it takes a whole day out of each end of your trip and if your just going down for a long weekend like I was trying to plan this fall, your screwed! Which it looks like I am for a short dive trip this fall!!!

You'ld think they would be running big time specials to get people down there to pump money into the economy to help things get back to normal!!

The travel industry has been trying to perfect customer no-service for some time now and I think this is just another notch in their belt to getting there.

 

[BadeInBulverde]

I'm one of the poor smucks that got caught up in this ... had air/hotel package leaving from San Antonio 8/1 (the 1st date they posted that was cancelled thru) staying at Casa Del Mar (a hotel even Funjet now says is operational)...

I discovered this problem on my own by diligently reading the various scuba boards about 4 hours after it was posted on the FJ web site ... and in a major panic I contacted my travel agent who confirmed indeed all FJ Charter flights were cancelled thru (at that time) 8/1 into Cozumel ... note I discovered this ... FunJet didn't contact me although they have my email, mailing address and phone number ...

At the time I discovered and confirmed the situation with my travel agent I was offered essentially 3 options ... 1-reschedule after 8/1 (not an option for me) and there was no garuntee that space would be available 2-reschedule to another destination - NEVER an option ... Coz is where I choose to go 3-Cancel for full refund - which I did ... note there was at that time no MENTION of scheduling into Cancun and getting ferry service (that all came about after the internet firestorm against FunJet a day later)

So ... having cancelled my package (and by the way I was advised as has been mentioned elsewhere it would be up to two billing cycles before my credit card was credited with the cancellation ... ) I scheduled AIR ONLY with Continental to the tune of $670/pp ... thus a total for air alone almost equal to the cost of the whole FJ package ... then I get to deal with Casa Del Mar trying to be sure I still have the room accomodations I have planned on ... I do ... but at a significantly higher cost now that I am out of the "package" ... and finally .. rather than the easy DIRECT FLIGHT from San Antonio to Coz and back ... I have to deal with a 1 hour connection in Houston going down and a 50 minute connection coming back (which I fully expect to miss based on previous history out of Coz).

I have a tremendous amount of ill will towards FunJet ... as far as I am concerned they are in a SERVICE industry ... and customer satisfaction should be fairly high on their priority list ... clearly after reading the boards for the last two days regarding this debaucal ... they have missed that mark ... but ... they won't ever have an opportunity to miss it again with me or any of my dive companions and family.

Bade

 

[Bill51]

It’s times like this I kick myself for not listening to my wife 10 years ago when she wanted to buy a couple 8 passenger twins and start a custom dive charter flight business to Cozumel and the Bahamas.

 

[TorontoDive]

No doubt, with the southern hotels down and others in question, Funjets business on Cozumel is going to take a serious setback. And some folks who have near-term plans with open hotels will be unhappy. Others who took a Funjet air only deal may be in a $$$ bind. But what should they do? What would be the right business decision? What would be FAIR?

Make it a two-way street. If Funjet can cancel on the travellers in the case of a hurricane, then the travellers should also be able to cancel (without penalty) in the case of a hurricane or other "act of God". Right? I'm sure that those people who were on flights departing TO Cancun/Cozumel on July16/17 would gladly have opted out of flying with a full refund but they were not given that option. It was either get on the plane or lose all your money. Now when Funjet sees they are going to lose money, they can just cancel on the travellers?

Being fair would mean that either both can cancel or neither can. This is apparently not the case. Albeit I agree that the update says a refund will be given in 14 days but what about the people who don't want a refund and would rather travel anyways since some of the hotels are now operational? A lot of people were screwed over by Funjet, many lost customers but I'm sure Funjet doesn't care.

 

[DallasNewbie]

I rescheduled into CUN, and wound up with a slightly cheaper fare. I was also told that the refund may take two billing cycles.

Funjet could very easily lose a small claims action brought by someone who wound up on a more expensive flight because of their cancelation, but I suspect that they are counting on the number of people going to the trouble to take legal action being small.

 

[Lawrence914]

They don't even need smaller planes, they could just cut back on flights. In some cases, they had several flights a day. This is going to be big trouble for Funjet. They will be sued. They can claim that they were unable to deliver what was promised to the vacation travelers because of the hurricane, but they have no excuse for dumping the air-only passengers. There's no "circumstances beyond their control" stopping them from flying a plane-load of air-only passengers into CZM today.

I suspect that there will be several repercussions from this. Funjet is going to be financially hurt, and I predict that they are going to cut back (or eliminate) air-only vacations.

Well said. I was actually told by a Funjet "customer service rep" (a.k.a. phone-drone) that if I had booked a full vacation with them, they would be more likely to help me out.

Funjet is really squirming... making any excuse to not fulfill even what they've posted on their website. Six hours of my life wasted talking to those guys today.

Screw Funjet.

-Lawrence

P.S. Thanks for the email address, Chris. I just sent my note.

 

[rje634]

I was also told that the refund may take two billing cycles.

Is FunJet going to reimburse you for the 2 months on accrued interest? Somehow I doubt it..