False advertising - Scam

[Amisillyornot]

Just after some advice re booking flights please. I booked some flights online which came to £3000.The money was taken from my account. 4 hours later, I get a call from the website stating that the airline is not honouring the flight at this price and I need to pay around £800 more to confirm this booking. I refused stating that the price I booked and paid for is what I am willing to pay and if it is no longer available, I want a refund. They said that they will charge me £200cancellation fee.
AIBU - they cannot charge me cancellation fee when I am not the one cancelling it?
Thanks and any advice on how to deal with this is much appreciated.

Has the money deinitely left your account or it is pending / ringfenced?

@Quveas I understand what you are saying but it wasn't even that cheap. It was around £70 cheaper than skyscanner but with 4 people, in my head that is £280 difference. But you are right, I should be more careful.

Trustpilot reviews are all saying it’s a scam? Why do people not check this out before sending away thousands of pounds.

It's in the terms and conditions that they don't accept liability for price increases and don't offer cancellations for price reasons. Whether than is fair in law is debatable but you will likely either have to pay the £800 or risk small claims court and losing it all plus the flight. Lesson learned book with the airline direct or one of the big names.

This sounds very scam like, bet they do this to everyone who books flights.

Always use a credit card for online purchases, far better protection that way.

Will be interesting to know the outcome, but sorry op, sounds like total shit and hassle.

Ah, but they are proper scammy according the reviews. Not sure how they get away with this shit. Hopefully the bank comes through for you OP. How they still have banking is a mystery.

@ThreeLittleDots bank conformed the money has gone. I am thinking may be that is why they waiting for a few hours before contacting me to inform me about the change.

It's also very interesting that they employ only 4 people none of whom appear to be called the names of the people mentioned in the one or two positive reviews on line. Fake reviews are, of course, not unknown.

This is from one of the review on Trustpilot

"Things you CAN do with an experience like this: Ask the travel firm for a complaints contact, raise a fraud report with your bank, cancel your card, report scam website to NCSC.gov, liaise via phone, email or chat with the citizen's advice who can approach trading standards on your behalf, use ATOL's site to check their membership, contact the information commissioner's office to report a GDPR breach if you have not received a response from the travel provider's complaints team or have evidence, contact Consumer Direct for advice 08454 040506, and finally, raise a concern with the police who can escalate to their fraud investigation team."

I have now sent an email to ask for all the information in writing as advised by a PP.
Thanks @PritiPatelsMaker -i will definitely look into that.

Was it holiday hypermarket as I had thr same experience, booking went through then they rang and asked for more money, I just said refund me instead please and they did

@Zola1 it is called Airwaay but trades under a few other names as well as I have found out afterwards.

Your bank should deal with this. As for paying by credit card, I thought this was a thing too until I said that to my bank a few months ago and they said you get the same protection with your debit card these days. So you should be good.

Try mentioning you're willing to take legal action, or go to the small claims court. The agent may well back down at that point. They must know it's a scam by now.

We never book through third parties any more, not since we were scammed by a hotel booking firm (we did think we were booking direct but it turned out we weren’t). We’d booked four nights in a hotel in Paris. When we got there the booking had been cancelled - not by us! Of course nobody answered the emergency number. Luckily the hotel had room for us. We never did get our money back despite making many complaints. We looked online and there were hu dress of bad reviews. The company was Gala Hotels.

Not quiet ..
With your credit card, even if you put £100 or so of the total cost on it, that makes the credit card company jointly liable for the whole cost of the bill.
You can then raise whats called a sectrion 75 dispute and the CC company would refund you fully and then chase the other company for their share.

With a debit card, you can raise a chargeback from your bank - but this can be disputed by the vendor and isnt the same atall as the cover that the section 75 gives you ..

Zola1 it is called Airwaay but trades under a few other names as well as I have found out afterwards

Those Trustpilot reviews really aren't great are they?

Unfortunately that is incorrect information. If it's in the terms and conditions that they are not responsible for price changes etc then there are no chargeback rights.

If there were chargeback rights, the service (flights) need to be cancelled before a chargeback can be raised.

Imjustadaddy has also provided incorrect information.

This transaction would not be eligible for a section 75 claim on a credit card as there is a 3rd party involved.

To be eligible for a section 75 claim the payment must be over £100 and less than 30k, have a direct link between customer and service provider (no 3rd parties involved) and the company must have breached the contract or misrepresented themselves.

@SnaccidentsHappen - but isn't the service provider Airway in this case. The airline hasn't even issues the tickets yet. Airway has taken the money - for what? some tickets that technically do not exist?

Unfortunately not, the travel agent is an intermediary. The airline is the service provider.