Last October i searched online for a hoiday to turkey, after finding what i was looking for i proceeded to book online with REGAL HOLIDAYS. After completing the credit card payment a screen came up and told me to ring for confirmation of booking, giving me a reference number. This was due to the fact that it was only a few days before the flight.
I was told the package was not available because the flights were sold out. They offered an alternative but i had to check with the rest of the group this was suitable, so Regal Holidays said they would ring me back the following morning. They didn't so i rang them. I told them the alternative flights were acceptable, only to be informed that the accomodation was not available. I could have the original accommodation i wanted for 10 nights but would then have to move for the remaining 4 days.
By this time i was fed up and told them to forget it. I booked the holiday i wanted with a different company straight after.
The day before our fight i received an invoice from Regal Holidays saying we had paid for the holiday £1400.00, which they had taken from my credit card. We rang Regal Holidays straight away to tell them they had made a mistake because we had already booked our holiday, which they told us was unavailable, with another company. We were passed from one person to another and eventually told to ring from Turkey the next day. I told them all i wanted them to do was refund the money.
As you can imagine we got nowhere with them. We phoned the bank to get the payment stopped but they couldn't do anything. Having now paid for 2 holidays on the credit card, this made our holiday strained becaused we were at our limit.
After lots of phone calls and letters we find that we are £1400.00 out of pocket because Regal Holidays say we confirmed the booking ,even though when they took payment for my booking it was a none existant holiday. They say we confirmed booking of an alternate holiday over the phone, but we did not. We told them to forget it! Trying to get the bank to sort it under the credit act hasn't worked either. Regal Holidays sent them a fax saying we confirmed booking on the phone. The bank says its our word against theirs, there isn't anything they can do.
We can't afford to take it to court ourselves, so BEWARE !!!! RING AND CHECK THE HOLIDAY IS AVAILABLE BEFORE ENTERING YOUR CREDIT CARD DETAILS.