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I’ve just gone to use some upgrade vouchers on a flight from Dubai to London, upgrading from economy to premium, and Virgins dynamic pricing strikes again….
I paid 1650 AED in taxes originally for the economy flights (x3) and then noticed the premium seats where only 2055 AED, so 405 AED upgrade cost with my vouchers, result.
However after getting through to Virgin to book the seats, as they had now dropped the taxes on economy flights to 945 AED, I had to pay 1100 AED in taxes to book the upgrade seats.
Taxes are taxes surely, how can you pay a tax on an original ticket, and then when you go to pay the difference on the taxes you originally paid to get the upgrade, Virgin devalue your original taxes payment?
Is this even legal?
With paying for your seat choice and now sneaky charges like this, Virgin are just on the road to losing all the goodwill they have built up over the years…
It’s a real shame as going from knowing exactly where you stood, to these cowboy tactics is just devaluing the brand so much.
Just off to tell my daughter we’re not getting an upgrade anymore!
Call again and get someone with a clue. Thy can’t reduce the cash amount you paid. It may take more than one attempt to get someone that can actually work their new system.
Only a proportion of the so-called taxes are taxes, the rest of it is just part of the fare, however davefl is still correct.
Did Virgin change staff to a call center or something? They used to be great but the last few months have been terrible.
If you call Virgin after UK business hours you get home workers abroad. Poor English, kids being tended to whilst on the phone, unable to do anything that’s not a basic action. It’s not worth the hassle. Call at 9am for a UK agent.
However good the UK agents are though, the new reward system has really done them over too. They can’t do what they used to and are frustrated and receiving frustration
I called this morning (I’m sure it was before 9) and got straight through to a lovely agent in Cardiff who dealt with my 3 requests extremely quickly and efficiently. Saved 46k points and nearly £400 by cancelling and rebooking my US trip for next March. I was charged exactly the amount of surcharges I’d been quoted in the app (£115 pp to go from PE to UC).
The agent may have been quite relieved to get someone who was actually delighted with the changes!
I called this morning (I’m sure it was before 9) and got straight through to a lovely agent in Cardiff who dealt with my 3 requests extremely quickly and efficiently. Saved 46k points and nearly £400 by cancelling and rebooking my US trip for next March. I was charged exactly the amount of surcharges I’d been quoted in the app (£115 pp to go from PE to UC).
The agent may have been quite relieved to get someone who was actually delighted with the changes!
So pleased you got a good deal. There’s hope for us all!
Virgin’s call centre used to be in Swansea. Sounds like it’s moved. Head Office is just south of Gatwick near Manor Royal/Crawley, where a lot of the airlines/tour operators have offices.
That might be me mixing up my Welsh cities 😳. They’re always really helpful there though.
There are good deals around if you only want to go one-way on VS. I might do some more research when the Xmas madness is over and look at whether any predictable patterns are emerging. It’s possible the good deals favour the “bad” UC seats but I don’t have enough data to make the call yet!
I had the same experience as NorthernLass this morning about 0915. My one way Tampa to LHR, with voucher, processed quickly and easy. 152k points minus 75k, net 77k for the voucher plus £500 taxes in UC for 2. Not a bad deal. As Rob says, better to book redemptions as 2 one ways now due to repricing when adding the return. As a data point, outbound from MAN to MCO was 104k minus 52k for voucher plus £900 taxes. All in all 129k points and £1400 for 2. Cash tickets for same flghts £3300 each, although no one else has booked onto the return from Tampa!
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