Virgin Tel Aviv cancellation

[ben1]

Hi, I was wondering if someone could help… Sorry for the long post but struggling to get anywhere.

I am going to Tel Aviv for a friends wedding in early April.

I booked all flights using miles.

Itinery was as follows (all in Upper);

London – Tel Aviv – 7th April 2025 on Virgin
Tel Aviv – Toronto via Heathrow on Virgin – 10th April 2025
Toronto – London on 20th April 2025

All flights were booked as one-ways.

Virgin Atlantic cancelled all TLV flights back at the back end of last year, and I have struggled to get hold of them either by chat (sometimes been a 60-90 min wait for someone to respond) and phone lines have said constantly busy. On the odd occasion I have been able to get hold of someone, I have been told that my only option for rebooking is cancellation even though that went directly against the published rebooking policy using El AL which states;

Customers must advise of changes to their travel plans ahead of their travel date, or no-show policy will apply as per fare rules
These options apply to customers ticketed on 932 tickets, tickets must be reissued using 932 ticket stock
Rebooking onto other airlines applies to customers impacted by cancelled flights between 8th October 2024 – 26th October 2025
Customers connecting to/from other VS/VS* services should remain on a VS/VS* flight where available. eg. NYC-LON-TLV. NYC-LON should remain on VS/VS*
Rebooking with other airlines must be rebooked using the rebooking table for each carrier below
Please include the SI stated within the reissue guidelines below for each carrier and include passenger/agency telephone number
Future voluntary changes are not permitted
Travel rebooked onto our airline partners listed below must be completed on/before 26th October 2025.

I have since, been able to book a BA flight using avios to Tel Aviv on 7th April, so I don’t need to worry about the outbound travel, BUT the Tel Aviv – Toronto leg i’ve not had much luck.

I have nationwide travel insurance (not sure points flights are covered now they’ve changed to aviva)? If I were to book my own travel arrangements at dates/times that work it’s a scary £4800.

I’ve hit a dead end with Virgin, and with less than a month to go, I’m starting to panic as I was hoping i’d eventually get an advisor who would actually help me out.

Any tips of advice, would be greatly appreciated.

[SamG]

Travel insurance will not cover this scenario. But there are UK261 (I think – third country to third country but via UK and on a UK carrier is OK?), Israeli and Canadian protections

I can’t see any availability that works with their listed rebooking policy (LY connecting to VS in London or Emirates/Fly Dubai) . So I think your best bet will be to write a straight forward to the CEO with some options that do have availability, quoting the relevant legislation

[NorthernLass]

I’ve phoned Virgin 3 times over the last 4 months and always got through to the Swansea office in a few minutes at the start of the day.

Were there no rebooking options in your account?

VS is obliged to re-route you, at least to London (and probably to Toronto (and back) if it was all on one booking; I’m surprised they’ve been fobbing you off like this. Also, their rebooking policy doesn’t supersede the law.

It’s very late in the day now so you do need to get some sort of back up plan in place if you want to do this trip. Not really sure why you let this go on so long?

If you have records of your conversations with Virgin and documented their refusal to re-route you, you *might* have a successful claim against them at CEDR to reclaim the cost of new flights, but again I think questions might be asked about why you didn’t take this step sooner.

I think there are a couple of Tel Aviv threads on here from when VS started cancelling these flights which might be helpful.

You don’t know how long a reply from the CEO might take, so I would call again asap, present them with some acceptable (to you) options, and make a careful record of their response.

[NorthernLass]

See also this article and comments:

https://www.headforpoints.com/2024/02/13/virgin-atlantic-extends-tel-aviv-flight-suspension/

And:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delta-air-lines-skymiles/2143966-help-canceled-virgin-operated-delta-ticketed-flight-tel-aviv.html

It looks as though some people have had a bit of success getting VS to rebook them onto El Al.

[Tracey]

Whereas Virgin should be rebooking you onto ElAl, they can only do so if ElAl gives them seats to do so. 7 April is preciously near to Passover, so I suspect that ElAl can extract such a premium for those flights that it is unwilling to release any. You could try keeping watch as ElAl have a habit of adding more flights and bigger planes if they can see the demand for that week, but I wouldn’t be holding my breath.

Whereas you say you have a BA flight on 7 April, BA haven’t actually started flying to TLV again yet. With the cease fire currently not in operation, I’d be looking at a backup for that one too. BA to Larnaca and Israir or Cyprus Airways on to TLV would be my bet.

[ben1]

Thanks to all the help so far.

Tracey wrote:

Whereas Virgin should be rebooking you onto ElAl, they can only do so if ElAl gives them seats to do so. 7 April is preciously near to Passover, so I suspect that ElAl can extract such a premium for those flights that it is unwilling to release any. You could try keeping watch as ElAl have a habit of adding more flights and bigger planes if they can see the demand for that week, but I wouldn’t be holding my breath.

Whereas you say you have a BA flight on 7 April, BA haven’t actually started flying to TLV again yet. With the cease fire currently not in operation, I’d be looking at a backup for that one too. BA to Larnaca and Israir or Cyprus Airways on to TLV would be my bet.

Whenever I have spoken to reps from Virgin eiter on chat or phone, they have told me that there are no rebooking options only a refund even though this goes against their published rebooking policy. They said this again again yesterday on chat when I eventually got through after 90 mins. What I asked, and didn’t get an answer, is that if there are cash seats available for purchase, why can’t Virgin rebook as their policy states to rebook in lowest booking class available (and has a whole table) – in the 2024 archive – https://flywith.virginatlantic.com/gb/en/partner-hub/vsbulletins/vsbulletins_archive.html

I am willing to be flexible and fly not necessarily on the 10th, but after passover begins when there is defintely cash seats for purchase, but still no luck.

With regards to the BA flight I booked for the outbound, when I wasn’t getting anywhere with Virgin, I booked an avios seat on a BA flight. Due to their policy for Tel Aviv, they offered free changes to El Al (even with flights that were listed as currerntly operating) which I jumped on straight away as I know they are going to fly come rain or shine, whereas I wasn’t convinced BA would actually restart (I think the flight I booked was the first day of restarting the route).

NorthernLass wrote:

I’ve phoned Virgin 3 times over the last 4 months and always got through to the Swansea office in a few minutes at the start of the day.

Were there no rebooking options in your account?

VS is obliged to re-route you, at least to London (and probably to Toronto (and back) if it was all on one booking; I’m surprised they’ve been fobbing you off like this. Also, their rebooking policy doesn’t supersede the law.

It’s very late in the day now so you do need to get some sort of back up plan in place if you want to do this trip. Not really sure why you let this go on so long?

If you have records of your conversations with Virgin and documented their refusal to re-route you, you *might* have a successful claim against them at CEDR to reclaim the cost of new flights, but again I think questions might be asked about why you didn’t take this step sooner.

I think there are a couple of Tel Aviv threads on here from when VS started cancelling these flights which might be helpful.

You don’t know how long a reply from the CEO might take, so I would call again asap, present them with some acceptable (to you) options, and make a careful record of their response.

Nope, no rebooking options on my account, just says cancelled, get in touch etc for rebooking which is what i’ve tried to do. All 3 tickets were seperate one way bookings, but that shouldn’t make a difference with regards to my rights for a rebooked flight. They’ve always taken the line my only option is a refund which I know is not the case, due to both israeli and canada air travel protections (I don’t think UK261 applies to 3rd country to 3rd country).

The reason I have left it so long as I have a young family and my own business which takes up a lot of my time. I don’t have hours to waste on the phone on hold which is my experiences. And even when I have been able to get through, i’ve not had any acceptable responses – I have kept a record.

[ben1]

SamG wrote:

tions only a refund even though this goes against their published rebooking policy. They said this again again yesterday on chat when I eventually got through after 90 mins. What I asked, and didn’t get an answer, is

I was hoping as a last resort my travel insurance may cover me as there is a section on travel disruption on my nationwide travel insurance :

Travel disruption
Unexpected additional travel and accommodation costs to allow continuation of the trip if pre-paid travel plans are disrupted

The only thing i’m not sure about is if they would cover it, as
A) Virgin should be the ones to rebook me
B) if the flight is covered as it was booked on points
C) If Tel aviv is covered due to what is going on in the region (even though there is not any FCO advice to NOT travel to the majority of Israel currently)