Thomson Flights - beware if you need to change your flight!

[lorra63]

A warning to anyone who books flights with Thomson!!
Where do I start... My Husband's son, mother and partner were due to fly out to join us in Tenerife on New Years eve 2008. Sadly, my father-in-law unexpectedly passed away on Christmas Day. My Husband and myself made the decision to fly back to the UK as soon as we could. We had absolutely no trouble changing our flights as we had booked with Monarch - in fact we were told at the airport by Monarch staff that they would have tryed to get us on the first available flight right up until check-in time closed.

As we had returned to the UK there was no point in the remainder of the family flying out to celebrate New Year - the last thing we all felt like doing!

Changing the flight was an entirely different experience for my Mother-in-law. Due to the fact the Thomson call centre was closed Christmas Day and Boxing day she called them at the first opportunity on the Saturday. After explaining the situation she was told that the lead passenger would need to call and they would need to give three days notice and pay the difference in the flight cost. When her partner contacted Thomson, he was told that they would not be able to change the flight to later in 2009. And was informed that 7 days notice would be required but even so they would lose all their money, however they would be happy to book them some new flights. Terms and conditions were quoted several times. It was only at this time that we became aware that Thomson have different rules for Scheduled and Charter flights. If this had been a scheduled flight they could have made the changes. So to anyone booking flights with Thomson check what type of flight you are booking. As for our family we will never be booking flights with Thomson again.

I know many people could say that they could claim on their insurance but as my Mother-in-law is no longer immediate family this was not possible.

As for Thomson, I fell very dissappointed with their call centre's response. In fact the first contact who told my mother-in-law that they could change their flights (name withheld) completely denied this on a later call.

At this very sad time for my family I hope this might even save just one person from losing their money.