My church had a trip to Israel booked in April through an agency. United Airlines cancelled their flight segments, yet the agency indicates UA is only offering credits, not refunds. The agency also says we have to book travel using the credit through them. The "group ticket desk" at UA has been coy in deferring responsibility to the agency even though UA cancelled the flight. The last UA rep I spoke with hinted that I should submit a refund request to UnitedAirlines.com/refund "but can't promise anything". Any advice/expertise on how to approach that? Does anyone know if the DOT law posted in the other UA thread applies to group tickets booked through an agency (we do have unique individual ticket numbers)?

The online refund request firm on United's website is pretty easy to fill out. I would just go ahead and do it.

When you paid for the tickets, did you pay the travel agency or United? If you paid the travel agency (and then they paid United), that may be why the travel agency is saying you have to rebook through them.

I think that's a ridiculous expectation, but I'm sure the travel agency wants to keep your money, too.

TXTransplant said:

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I'm sure the travel agency wants to keep your money, too.

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I'm a part-time, home-based travel agent and the agency does not have your money. The travel vendors and the airlines do.

There is no commission on air. Airlines are screwing travel agencies left and right. I have heard of telephone hold times as high at 5-6 hours. And they ignore your emails.

The travel vendors and the airlines will fight you tooth and nail if you want cash. They are pushing credit (I've seen some as high as 150%).

I have a large group of friends (including me) with $20,000 in deposits and they will not refund money. When I contact them about the refund I find the last person I spoke with has been "furloughed". They continue to push credits.

We canceled in February when I noticed the big problems in Italy.f Have been tap dancing with them ever since.

Good luck,

Keep trying for a refund. I FINALLY got one today after trying for a month being and denied three previous times.