Consumers Let down by Travel Agency
By Darren Cronian on Tuesday, February 20th, 2007

I like many watched BBC Watchdog this evening and witnessed the distressed consumers who had booked a holiday through Avon Travel Agency Limited, to be told on arrival at the airport that the travel agency had not paid for the tickets.

Badly run or a Dodgy Travel Company?

I don’t want to be a scare mongerer, but as consumers we can learn a lot from these poor consumers experiences. If you look at the companies website in Google, it smells fishy. The title of the website is “homes for sale apartments dating at avontravelltd.com” – does this sound like a respectable travel agency?

The ATOL number was ‘6437’ according to a previous archive of the website back in 2006, this no longer exists according to the ATOL database, so this makes me wonder how easy it is for a travel agency to be registered by ATOL and the rest.

My Advice

- Call the airline or travel operator before you travel, in fact call them a few weeks after you’ve made your booking and 48 hours before you depart.

- If they are selling package holidays or flights check the ATOL, ABTA, TTA etc bonding number, if it doesn’t exist contact the appropriate association and do not book with them.

- You should get receipts from the airline or travel operator, if you do not get any receipts within a few weeks of making the booking, contact the travel agency and find out when the receipts will arrive

Please, if you’re not sure about the company you are looking to book then check the internet, do a search on the company name, or director name, and refer to my previous blog article on detecting dodgy travel companies.


Related Posts:





Subscribe to RSS Submit to StumbleUpon Bookmark page

13 responses to “Consumers Let down by Travel Agency”

Arnold | 25 February, 2007 at 11:20 am

I would go further than that and advise calling the hotels and car hire companies etc. to check that they will honour the reservations.

When TravelExtras went bust in 2005 I’m quite sure that many of the companies that they used would not have honoured any reservations in that they’d not received any money from the company. Bear in mind too that TravelExtras wasn’t some fly by night company either but had been vetted by FlyBE (among others) yet still managed to go bankrupt.

The receipts and vouchers that they had issued to people would just have been worthless paper.

Graham | 26 February, 2007 at 7:29 am

Im surprised by the lack of comments on this article Darren. This is good advice, and I noticed that your blog is no.2 for Avon Travel Agency Limited. Ouch!

Darren Cronian | 26 February, 2007 at 3:12 pm

Graham, the power of blogs huh! :)

I think theres a problem with the comments box because Ive received a few emails from readers whilst I have been away in Oslo. Will get on to that problem today now I have finally woken up.

Rohan | 26 February, 2007 at 3:17 pm

No2. in what?

Darren Cronian | 27 February, 2007 at 1:22 pm

Google Rohan.

Well that’s what I assume!

Nicholas Lee | 27 February, 2007 at 2:01 pm

Other thing to do is check the website of CAA-ATOL, ABTA, TTA, ATIO, etc and see if there membership is vaild. Good tip is to Ctrl-F5 the page to make sure your looking at an upto date version.

Also just a comment, if you book an air ticket with an ATOL member ATOL does not have to cover it. This is something that has happen before and will happen again.

You book the ticket and turn up at airport and airline says “we sorry but you will have to pay us if you want to fly”.

Getting back you speak to CAA and they say sorry ATOL does not cover that transaction.

Darren if you want more on this just let me know.

Rohan | 27 February, 2007 at 10:35 pm

So what do ATOL do then?

Debbie | 4 March, 2007 at 11:57 pm

I am thinking the same Rohan. Can anyone answer?

How can a company sell package holidays when they are not registered.

David Marshall | 22 May, 2007 at 6:59 pm

I appeared on the Watchdog programme and am still looking for Jamil and partners. We booked through what appeared to be a reputable agent - Good Website, links to all the online travel portals and a office - We checked his ATOL number online and all was well. Only 1 month earlier my brother bought round the world tickets from them and he went with no problems, 1 month later and it fell to pieces. It may cost me more money in the future but I am not booking through an agent again for a long time. They are crooks and should be treated like crooks - The police are not prepared to do anything about it because they have more important things to do such as arresting small children for throwing cucumber !!!! I think the trick is that if you do get caught out - make sure they pay somehow and never do it again……..

Sean | 26 June, 2007 at 9:48 am

Is this a common occurrence or more of an isolated case ? Seems to me like the business was legit until something went wrong with it…

David Marshall | 8 October, 2007 at 12:28 pm

I think this is quite common, what with builders and travel agents letting people down - everyone know someone who has been swindled or given appauling service from either or both of the above industries.

The business seamed legitimate at the beginning of the year when they took payment, very soon afterwards it must have got into trouble.

A few months before we booked the Australia visit, my brother went through them with no problems.

If a company is in any doubt they cannt supply they should not do it - its a question of business ethics… People that run away when they know they are in the wrong should be pursued…. Its not fair.

Elaine o'Reilly | 15 January, 2008 at 5:36 pm

A friend of mine has recently booked a ticket back to South Africa on the Internet via Prime Travel in Hounslow ,Middx.
After 2 months he had still not received the ticket so he phoned to check where it was. The bloke said he was not in the country but would send it via email. 3 days before my friend was due to go he checked with the airline and they said the ticket had been booked but not payed for. My friend had payed Prime Travel the money but they failed to pass it onto the airline. This is a warning to others DO NOT BOOK WITH THIS TRAVEL AGENTS.

Catherine Crehan | 20 April, 2008 at 1:34 am

How do I check out travel agents to see if they are legit before I give them my information?

Please post a comment