Affiliated company is in the news!!

Just to share.. An extracted post of a forum posted online..

Travel agent makes untrue excuses for not making refund
I WANT to share my painful experience of trying to get a refund from Zuli Travel Pte Ltd.
On Sept 26, I walked in to Zuli's office to buy a Royal Brunei Airlines return ticket to Sydney (E-ticket No. 672 6994769867). Payment was made by credit card on the same day.

However, due to personal reasons, I was not able to fly to Sydney. On Oct 3, I went back to Zuli's ticketing office to get a refund. My refund was handled by Zuli's Ms XXX.

I was told that a sum of $100 was needed to process the refund, being charges for airline fees of $75 and Zuli fees of $25. The balance would be the amount that I would be receiving. I was also told that, normally, it would take 3-6 months to get my money back.

I agreed and told Zuli to process the refund. I was very surprised that it took that long to get a refund but was told that the long refund period was beyond Zuli's control.

I was told that, normally, Zuli would receive the money back from the airlines between three and six months later. However, if Zuli got the money earlier than the normal period of 3-6 months, I would get my refund faster.

Zuli would transfer the money to my UOB credit card account immediately after receiving the refund from the airline. Its acknowledgement of the refund ticket was in the form 'Receipt for Refund Ticket' dated Oct 3 (Zuli's Ref. No. RFxxxxx). The breakdown of total fees ($100) that would be deducted from the original ticket price was stated in the 'Receipt for Refund Ticket'.
As my October credit card bill would soon be due, I thought it would be nice to have the total amount due offset by the refund and I would just have to pay the difference.

On Oct 30 (or 31), I called Zuli customer service line to check on the status of the refund. I got a similar reply from Zuli's customer service officer that my refund would take between three and six months to process and Zuli would refund the money immediately after receiving it from Royal Brunei Airlines.

When asked whether Zuli could help me talk to Royal Brunei Airlines to expedite my refund process, I was told that Zuli had forwarded all the necessary documents to Royal Brunei Airlines and told me to just wait.

In the first week of December, I went to Royal Brunei Ticketing Office with my ticket and Refund Receipt from Zuli to check the status of my refund and, maybe, by visiting the office personally, it might help expedite the process.

The Royal Brunei staff, Mdm YYY, was shocked to hear that I had not received my refund as the money had been transferred to Zuli in October. She tried to help me by calling Zuli and speak to Ms ZZZ (Ms XXX had resigned). She was also very upset with Zuli's refund practice and suggested that I go to Zuli and look for Ms ZZZ.

On the same day, I went to Zuli's ticketing office to speak to Ms ZZZ. I wanted an explanation from Zuli why it did not refund me the money when it had already been reimbursed by Royal Brunei Airlines. The meeting was disappointing - the reply from Ms ZZZ was very unsatisfactory. When I demanded to speak to the manager, Ms ZZZ told me that the manager would give me a call me and she asked for my contact number.

Before the end of the day, I received a call from Mr AAA. When asked why Zuli did not tell me the truth that it had the money from Royal Brunei Airlines when I called on Oct 30, he explained that the customer service staff did not communicate with the finance and accounting people.

Mr AAA promised that my case would be given priority and that I would receive the money in two to three days. Thinking that I would get my refund soon, I was prepared to close the case.
Two or three days later, on Friday Dec 7, I received a call from the bank's credit card centre that the bank had received a refund from Zuli. To my surprise, the amount was different from what I was supposed to get.

I went to Zuli's office again on Saturday Oct 8 to find out why there was a $25 difference and was told there was another service fee which Zuli charged me. I believe that it is not right for Zuli to charge an additional service fee of $25 when the total refund fees had been pre-agreed in the beginning.

When I complained about this, Zuli staff told me that somebody from the company would call me the following Monday.

To date, I have not received any call from Zuli. I feel that Zuli is not interested to handle my complaint.

QQQ

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Agreed on 3 to 6 months for refund, was rather free, tried his luck, and got his way.. Impressive..

Sometimes how one can go the distance amaze me..

Credit cards make or break a man?

For me, i often feel that owning one gives status and overrated spending power.

Say if i have all my bills duly paid with no arrears, meaning totally solvent, i seriously wont even consider spend time calling A, paying a visit to both A and B to prevent myself from paying a bill.

A bill i would duly pay if i utilise it.

Also, spend "little" time in sharing the experience by penning a 833 words essay.

What say you?

**Disclaimer: Names/Titles edited to prevent defamation to all parties involved.

Interested parties can visit: http://www.straitstimes.com/ST%2BForum/Online%2BStory/STIStory_186772.html