TCD Compensation

[edg]

Well, after a surprisingly short time TCD have agreed to pay us some compo for our nightmare trip on 3rd/4th july. They have said they will pay us £133 altogether for lack of service and the extra costs we had ( not for alcohol though:( With the insurance money we got that makes a total of about £250 back for all the hassle. Have decided to take it and just put it down to experience. They put at the end of the letter " I hope we can be of service to you in the future" :lol: ...........er.....no!!!

[ukwdwnut]

Well, after a surprisingly short time TCD have agreed to pay us some compo for our nightmare trip on 3rd/4th july. They have said they will pay us £133 altogether for lack of service and the extra costs we had ( not for alcohol though:( With the insurance money we got that makes a total of about £250 back for all the hassle. Have decided to take it and just put it down to experience. They put at the end of the letter " I hope we can be of service to you in the future" :lol: ...........er.....no!!!


well at least its something :clap: :clap:

who you going with next time :wink: :lol:

[edg]

will go with virgin or BA next time. TCD may be cheaper but it really isnt worth going with them. They say you get what you pay for but you dont even get that with TCD

[ukwdwnut]

but they arent cheaper tho, i got virgin cheaper than they could quote me for flights, car and a villa

[redlock]

Mike,
I have continually heard you say Virgin is cheaper than TCD. Surely you must get these better deals by traveling at certain times. I have used TCD about six times and have had the odd delay but overall have been pleased with them. I have also traveled with Virgin as well. I have always found TCD to be cheaper. Usually by a few hundred quid.
I know Virgin offer a better traveling experience but I think the couple of hundred quid would be better spent in Florida.
I know you have said you do not use Virgin direct and shop around for tour operators which use VA but I have still never bettered TCD by doing this also. It must be the time of year in which I travel. VA would probably be better for me with the earlier landing time as I usually get off the plane and drive to St Pete's Beach for two weeks (R+R instead of MM). But I put the money saved into an overnight stop in Orlando and head for the coast early the next day.
I suppose this could be the reason I cannot get a better price as I stay on the coast and do not have the range of hotels which Orlando offers.

I have read the reports of delays etc on this board regarding TCD and feel sorry for the people involved, but I think you can get bad experiences from any airline.
As i said, I think TCD do try to keep costs down which does bring the ''cheap and cheerful'' tag.
Also as up to last year VA was using Air Atlanta 747-200's on its Manchester route, painted in VA colours but more or less the same age of aircraft as TCD was using. Admitted, they have now brought in the newer 747-400's and TCD have brought in 747-300's.

All The Best,
Mark.

[Dotty Dot]

i dont know anywhere that you can get a 50inch seat pitch and huge wide seat staight to florida for TCD prices and i have looked/ virgin want an arm and a leg and all the other dont have the room. and even when we paid an arm and a leg for virgin club we had problems now they have the UC seats they want even more cash for the seat

[Keith]

I'm with Mike on this one

I phoned TCD a few months ago... got through to a rude guy who eventually gave me a price but couldnt even tell me if the plane would have seat back tvs. I looked around, got TCD prices that were a bit better than tcd direct then I called virgin and they beat the price. Simple as that, they were cheaper. To be honest, I found virgin EVEN CHEAPER later on the web through another website but I'd been so happy with virgin beating tcd I'd booked immediately.

It's also definitely true to say that a few days +/- can save hundreds but of course that's the same for any airline! I'd certainly move the holiday a day or two back/forward to go with virgin not tcd though!

In terms of all airlines having problems, they all do but virgin has extra planes and staff to deal with problems, tcd don't seem to. Hence you get delays and problems much more frequently than on virgin and the delays are for longer.

Case in point, got an email about a month back from a guy who'd paid for sunshine first.. he'd been telling me for months how important the flight was to him and he'd paid the extra. His flight was delayed over a day and then when he got to the plane he'd been bumped from sunshine first with no explanation other than they'd oversold it! He did actually get a refund for the extra cost eventually but that wasn't the point.

There have been tons of threads on this and it's not people saying virgin is perfect and no one ever does well out of tcd! Sure some do just fine and sure some have problems on virgin... but when I'm betting on getting my holiday off to a troublefree start, the odds are much better with virgin than tcd.

[ukwdwnut]

Mike,
I have continually heard you say Virgin is cheaper than TCD. Surely you must get these better deals by traveling at certain times. I have used TCD about six times and have had the odd delay but overall have been pleased with them. I have also traveled with Virgin as well. I have always found TCD to be cheaper. Usually by a few hundred quid.
I know Virgin offer a better traveling experience but I think the couple of hundred quid would be better spent in Florida.
I know you have said you do not use Virgin direct and shop around for tour operators which use VA but I have still never bettered TCD by doing this also. It must be the time of year in which I travel. VA would probably be better for me with the earlier landing time as I usually get off the plane and drive to St Pete's Beach for two weeks (R+R instead of MM). But I put the money saved into an overnight stop in Orlando and head for the coast early the next day.
I suppose this could be the reason I cannot get a better price as I stay on the coast and do not have the range of hotels which Orlando offers.

I have read the reports of delays etc on this board regarding TCD and feel sorry for the people involved, but I think you can get bad experiences from any airline.
As i said, I think TCD do try to keep costs down which does bring the ''cheap and cheerful'' tag.
Also as up to last year VA was using Air Atlanta 747-200's on its Manchester route, painted in VA colours but more or less the same age of aircraft as TCD was using. Admitted, they have now brought in the newer 747-400's and TCD have brought in 747-300's.

All The Best,
Mark.

i always go the last 2 weeks in october so its half term then, never ever been any other time of year, and tcd could not better the price i got for flights, car and villa :D which was a comparison from tcd when planning last years trip and what i already had, which beat tcd by 300-400 quid i think :D

[ukwdwnut]

I'm with Mike on this one

I phoned TCD a few months ago... got through to a rude guy who eventually gave me a price but couldnt even tell me if the plane would have seat back tvs. I looked around, got TCD prices that were a bit better than tcd direct then I called virgin and they beat the price. Simple as that, they were cheaper. To be honest, I found virgin EVEN CHEAPER later on the web through another website but I'd been so happy with virgin beating tcd I'd booked immediately.

It's also definitely true to say that a few days +/- can save hundreds but of course that's the same for any airline! I'd certainly move the holiday a day or two back/forward to go with virgin not tcd though!

In terms of all airlines having problems, they all do but virgin has extra planes and staff to deal with problems, tcd don't seem to. Hence you get delays and problems much more frequently than on virgin and the delays are for longer.

Case in point, got an email about a month back from a guy who'd paid for sunshine first.. he'd been telling me for months how important the flight was to him and he'd paid the extra. His flight was delayed over a day and then when he got to the plane he'd been bumped from sunshine first with no explanation other than they'd oversold it! He did actually get a refund for the extra cost eventually but that wasn't the point.

There have been tons of threads on this and it's not people saying virgin is perfect and no one ever does well out of tcd! Sure some do just fine and sure some have problems on virgin... but when I'm betting on getting my holiday off to a troublefree start, the odds are much better with virgin than tcd.


:iagree:

[Melfuzz]

I didnt like a lot of the hotels TCD offered. I went to tripadvisor to see what real opinions of them were and alot werent good.

I also get my virgin flights a lot cheaper than TCD

[tweenie123]

After my bad experience with TCD this year I'm really reluctant to book with them again, however I'm just at the stage of looking for flights for next summer. As I'm a teacher I'm stuck with the school holidays and we always go the last week in July/first week in August. I spent most of the weekend looking for the cheapest flight and TCD seem to have it by a long way. For two adults and a child, they're coming in at approx £1680 whereas the next cheapest is just over £2000! I keep thinking what I could spend the extra money on especially as we're having a cruise at the end of the holiday. My husband's logic is that they won't lose all our luggage two years running but that doesn't really inspire me with confidence to book them again! Plus I don't relish the thought of sitting in Manchester airport for over twelve hours which seems to be the norm at the moment.

[redlock]

I have mostly gone in early to mid may, so this may have some bearing on the price, because I have never been able to beat TCD prices after weeks of looking and checking all the operators to Fla.

[Vikki]

As I'm a teacher I'm stuck with the school holidays and we always go the last week in July/first week in August. .

DH and I are also teachers. We go at the end of the holidays, it's a bit cheaper, and not as busy. If you can do it, I would recommend it :D

[tweenie123]

I've thought about that but am usually in school for A level/GCSE results unfortunately!

[Vikki]

Ahhhhhhh, I see, that really limits things for you! I teach year 2, and DH teachers R/1 so not a problem :)

[soph&sarasdad]

tweenie123

I'm in the same boat as you. Secondary school teacher AND exams officer so I have to be back for 'A' Levels & GCSE results :( ( I managed to miss the A levels this year but that was a mix up with holiday booking...honest:whistle:)

I can't find anybody cheaper than TCD for next year but the 24 hr delay and damage to our baggage this time makes me very hesitant in booking with them again.

If anybody can find me a cheap Virgin flight for the last week of July 2006 I'll stand them a case of Bud and that is a promise!

[ukwdwnut]

tweenie123

I'm in the same boat as you. Secondary school teacher AND exams officer so I have to be back for 'A' Levels & GCSE results :( ( I managed to miss the A levels this year but that was a mix up with holiday booking...honest:whistle:)

I can't find anybody cheaper than TCD for next year but the 24 hr delay and damage to our baggage this time makes me very hesitant in booking with them again.

If anybody can find me a cheap Virgin flight for the last week of July 2006 I'll stand them a case of Bud and that is a promise!


i got one by phoning cheapesflights.co.uk on 0871 9832 196 virgin for £370 last oct :D

[Vikki]

If anybody can find me a cheap Virgin flight for the last week of July 2006 I'll stand them a case of Bud and that is a promise!

If you're not with the flying club, let me recommend you, then you'll get points off the next flight after that :wink: And I'm just trying to get as many people to recommend as humanly possible :D

[soph&sarasdad]

Thanks... we are members of the "frequent Virgins" holiday club which gets us 10% of the final invoice but, unfortunately, this has never amounted to anything approaching the price offered by TCD.

If you need any of my details to recommend me just PM me and I'll let you know.

Martin