I apologise for concern caused by my comment about CAA doing nothing, but when a forum poster has posted that they believe Travelrepublic is doing nothing, I have attempted to rectify the situation. The CAA is moving slowly to clear all the outstanding claims it has, but is taking a long time due to the sheer volume, and perhaps, the intervention of the lawyers.

In the particular claims of forum members on here, I believe that Travelrepublic has nothing left that it can do, (apart from call the CAA to try and get them moved to nearer the top of the pile) and that has been the case since October time, when, I will agree, we were being too slow in processing the high volume of claim forms were were receiving. If I am wrong in making this statement, please speak up!

The credit card companies at first paid out on claims for XL bookings, but then claimed the money back from the customer and advised them to go down the CAA route. A sign of the times, I think.

Travelrepublic had paid Freedom Flights or their administrators in full for ALL bookings made, except those few made after the last (weekly) direct debit payment and XL announcing they were no longer trading. These bookings were refunded immediately.

I am sorry your experience on the phone Alice, this isnt what should happen at all, and, I would hope, would not happen should you ask again. We do now have IPP protection for all the components of a tailor made holiday, but still stress the fact that you are not being sold a package, and are making separate transactions.

I'm still waiting for my refund but agree with Steve's statement. I was annoyed at TR at first as they took ages to pass on my claim to the CAA (this was admitted by Steve). However, once I brought this to his attention he was very helpful in escalating my claim with the CAA. It is now the CAA that I hold to blame for the slow refunding process and also for not keeping us informed with regards as to how much longer we'll have to wait.

My letter was sent back to them on Saturday. I'm off on holiday this Saturday for one week but I shall be calling CAA on my return to see when the promised refund will materialize. By the way, it seems that we haven't all had the same letters. Johndoe has had a totally different letter to me

i feel it only fair to add that travel republic processed our claim forms very quickly actually,and it is the caa that is dragging its heels.

Just want to report that it's all over at last. My dad had a cheque in the post this morning. Yippee! and not before time too. Good Luck everyone - hopefully you won't have to wait much longer.

That's good news. Same sort of time frame as others on the forum below.

Was going to post this today to see if it would help you shirley, but it would appear you are now refunded. Still I will post as it may add some info for others to see the content of the letters between everyone.
http://www.travel-rants.com/2008/09/30/caa-needs-to-improve-its-process-for-refunding-claims/

It would appear by signing the assignment when it arrives you are handing your claim to the CAA so that they can claim from TravelRepublic after they have issued a refund.

hi everyone,
i've just received my assignment letter, i have signed it and will post it today. fingers crossed and lets see how long it takes...

It would appear by signing the assignment when it arrives you are handing your claim to the CAA so that they can claim from TravelRepublic after they have issued a refund.

The claim is not against Travel Republic.

Assignment of the debt enables the CAA to claim against any assets that are recovered from the company in administration. If you were claiming against your insurance you would do the same.

fwh

CAA are paying the refunds, but will take court action to claim back the money form that those agents deemed to be breaking the guidelines. So they will be looking to the agent who sold the 'flight package'.

I don't work for the CAA by the way.

fwh did you read the forum with copies of the letters - did you read the link?

TR is the agent, unless you know something.

I am not on a mission here and you yourself have commented that TR are being economical with the truth.
I'll leave it to you all to decide who to trust in future when you book your trips.

When a Tour Operator goes into administration then where you are protected under ATOL or insurance they will reimburse you. Having done so, they will ask you to assign the debt to them. They then become the creditor instead of you. The same thing applies if you are reimbursed by your credit card supplier.

TR is only the agent. The CAA or CC supplier will take action if they consider TR has any responsibility but they also could be a creditor.

Where someone is reimbursed by a third party the only way in which they can recover that money is for you to assign the debt to them, without you doing so they would not have any claim.

As an example. Some years ago I was burgled. Some of the property was recovered and returned to me. The people responsible were prosecuted. The insurance paid me for the property not recovered. They then required me to assign to them so they could pursue those responsible for reimbursement. By doing so I gave up that right, although that did not prevent me , if I wished to do so, from taking action for the excess or damages for stress etc.

The involvement of TR is due to the way the system works. When Hellenic went bust last year I claimed against my CC rather than ATOL because that is the system. They were both TO and agent and I had only paid a deposit.

fwh

The claim is not against Travel Republic.

Hi FWH,
That's also what I was led to believe. However, the letter I received from CEGA was entitled 'Assignment of your claim against: Travel Republic and went on to state that I needed to sign an assignment of my claim against TR. Aliceadventures is quite correct in stating that the CAA will refund with the intention of claiming back from TR. At least this is what my letter said is going to happen in my case.

Steved1 is the person who may be able to answer that question, but CAA/ATOL will refund those who are eligible. It may be that some monies had not been passed from TR to Excel when they went bust and is still held by quite legally by TR. At some point they will pass that money on to CAA/ATOL.

Whilst I can understand the frustration some people feel they will eventually get their money back A big improvement from the days when there was no protection.

fwh

http://www.caa.co.uk/default.aspx?catid=1804&pagetype=90
The CAA website has recently been updated for guidance on XL claims and can be seen on the link above.

Some travel agents sold a flight sourced from Freedom Flights with accommodation and/or car rental from another source for their customers in an arrangement which appears to be a package as set out in the Package Travel Regulations 1992. It is the CAA and ATT's view that some travel agents are legally responsible for providing customers with their refunds in these cases.

Just been looking at the updated information and the above comment is very interesting. It has been said in the past here on HT that members interpretation of the Package Travel Regulations 1992 applied when a travel agent put together a holiday. Interesting to see that the CAA also view it that way

fwh

rang caa today to confirm they had received my bank statment ,stamped and signed by the bank,that they had already received ,to prove that the payment to travel republic had come from my account. yes they had, but they did not have my atol receipt for the atol donation of £1 per person for the flight booking! this is the first time i have heard of this!! so he rang travel republic on my behalf and they are going to send the receipt to caa but i still have to complete a 3 question form to say that i received the receipt after failure, the invoice before failure and that i was aware that i was booking with freedom flights. has anyone else had to do this? i wont even get the claim assignment letter until the claim is ready to be paid. thisjust goes on and on. each time i have spoke to someone they have said that the paperwork is all correct,except for bank statement not having my name on it. the invoice for my flights have the atol donation on it but this isnt enough!! ARGGGH!!!!

Hi bushbaby, please pm me your TR booking ref and the CAA claim number and I will find out exactly what is wrong.

==============

This is interesting, from BBC Watchdog site, a quote from CAA.

When Watchdog contacted the CAA they said: "All customers with a valid ATOL claim will get their refund and the CAA is working to ensure that this happens.

"We apologise to all claimants awaiting refunds for the delay they're experiencing, but it's taken time to resolve the legal complexities of the failure given the many different ways that XL traded.

"Previous experience indicates that, with a failure of this size and complexity, it's likely to take about a year from the date of the failure for all valid claims to be submitted and processed. The rate of progress is heavily dependent on the speed with which all concerned supply us with the information we need.

"The repatriation of over 85,000 passengers due to fly home on XL last year demonstrated the value of the ATOL scheme and customers can be assured that they can continue to count on ATOL to protect them."

I have been advised the CAA has 63000 claims for XL, and has so far paid out 19000 of them. So above estimate looks about right.

Hi FWH, we had either paid XL(Freedom Flights) in full, or the XL administators. I believe a few bookings were delayed in being processed by the CAA because we had paid the administators, but once we supplied a bank statement confirming payments and administrators confirmed receipt, the claims were no longer delayed. Last one I heard dragging it's heels on this was back in January, a couple of these have been paid now.

The legal issue between Travelrepublic and CAA should not slow claims from my understanding. Indeed, there are people on this and other forums who have been paid, who booked a flight and accommodation with Travelrepublic and other travel agencies.

Anybody know what happened with Travelrepublic in court on wed 8th April?

Maryb