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Bravofly scam?

Sydney, Australia
2 posts
2 reviews
Bravofly scam?
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I would like to know if anyone has had any good dealing with bravo fly?

I made a booking from Sydney to Paris with them in May, everything was going well until I had to contact bravofly and their terrible customer service team. Seriously the worst lot of human beings t deal with, they have only one response, wait for an email from them, that's it, anything other than that and you just get abuse. All I needed to do was cancel and reschedule a flight due my partners fathers death. But instead of any sort of compassion all I received was a big screw you from bravofly. Refusal to assist, even the airline call centre was more help but could not actually do anything without approval from bravofly. I have subsequently missed my flights due to bravofly and don't think they will ever allow me to reschedule.

Just want to know if this is a scam so I can inform my credit card company to retrieve the refund?

London, United...
Level Contributor
27,179 posts
25 reviews
47 helpful votes
1. Re: Bravofly scam?
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Eh, I very much doubt it, read the terms and conditions you agreed to. I suspect you bought a non changeable, non refundable flight. And non changeable non refundable tickets are pretty much that.

If you want to do a charge back with your cc provider, this is what they will look at, the terms and conditions of your contract. If you bought a non refundable non changeable ticket, then they will not refund you obviously.

Also, if you have missed your flights, it's doubtful you are due anything at all.

Do you have travel insurance? Might be worth checking to see if you are covered for cancellations for this circumstance. If not, then it's simply one of these things and it's to your own expense.

Vancouver, Canada
Destination Expert
for Vancouver
Level Contributor
87,106 posts
62 reviews
97 helpful votes
2. Re: Bravofly scam?
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I don't think you cancelled your flights, you no-showed, so even if you had travel insurance, I don't think you would qualify for reimbursement.

I would keep at it though. Keep a record of all your phone calls, content of the call, what happened, who said what. I think you have good grounds for being rescheduled but be prepared for the price to jump as is often the case with rescheduled flights.

Next time, read and understand the T&Cs of the ticket you are thinking of purchasing. You don't expect to need to live by them but it seems that something has reared its ugly head this time. They are not in business to offer compassion. Unfortunately, the customer has to think of the worst case scenario and could they live with that before clicking the buy button. And stay away from the likes of bravofly and other 3rd party online agents anyway.

Edited: 9 years ago
Dubai, United Arab...
Destination Expert
for Air Travel
Level Contributor
20,810 posts
41 reviews
59 helpful votes
3. Re: Bravofly scam?
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My heartfelt condolences.

You may need to share a bit more facts first. Did you cancel the flight? There is a difference if you cancelled the flight or if you just did not show up for a flight (no show). The term "miss" indicates to me, that you made a no show. In this case you most likely lost all your money (depending T&C of Bravo and/or airline as mentioned in post 1 & 2)

If you did cancel and you write "my partners fathers death", are you married with your partner or not? If you are married, then there might be an exception depending on the T&C of Bravo and the airline waving cancellation penalties for death of family members. The problem here is to get through to Bravo, then to the airline, then understand what the definitions are and then finally get your money (partially) back.

However in the latter case a travel insurance might cover you (again it depends on definitions of coverage).

To manage your expectations, you most likely lost the money.

UK
Level Contributor
49,560 posts
82 reviews
193 helpful votes
4. Re: Bravofly scam?
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My commiserations.

It's exceptionally unlikely that you would have been able to change your ticket, you have two sets of conditions that affect it, the airlines and bravoflys, both apply.

However you may have been due some money back, such as taxes, for a flight not taken if cancelled before you fly.

To answer your direct question, no they are nota scam they are just (looking at all the reports here) a company with utterly dismal customer service.

I would be very surprised if you would get any money back by claiming fraud, and unfortunately a credit card company won't give any money back just because of lousy service, but you could always have a try it's possible their lousy service will also apply to dealing with the credit card companies. But I would expect that's the one bit that's robust.

I encourage you to give it a, go, but next time, bearing in mind you actually asked a question about if anyone had any good experiences with Bravofly, I suspect that means you never did a search in here for them, where you'd find multiple hundreds of complaints.

So next time booking an airline or indeed buying anything, don't just robotically click on the cheapest, do a quick google search or a search in TA if it's travel related.

Most regulars here advise you book direct with the airline because abysmal customer service is only one of many problems with third party booking companies. Including the fact that usually they are no cheaper, they lie about pricing and hide additional charges.

Sydney, Australia
2 posts
2 reviews
5. Re: Bravofly scam?
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Thanks for the reply guys

I did purchase a ticket that is refundable and transferable, I made sure of this as we were aware that we may have to change the return flight but did not think we would need to change the first flight.

I drove for 6hours to the airport to cancel the flight in person with the airline ( as per the recommendation of the airlines customer service ) so that I would avoid a no show which would make the flights invalid.

I had been contacting bravofly for 5 days prior to the flight to change it, but was informed by bravo that it was the airline refusing to change the flight, when I asked for a copy of the refusal or any correspondence I was told by bravo that I would have to wait 24hours for an email, same response I seem to always get from them, then was told to stop calling bravo about this matter. I contacted the airline and they confirmed that they have not received anything from bravo about a change.

I am engaged to my partner but we still have not married. We are not really after a refund, I would just like to change the flights as this trip was to see my grandmother who is in the uk and has fallen ill, not great timing to be dealing with a death and ilness. Our travel insurance has informed us that as we haven't used our first flights that we are not covered by them until we leave.

Think I will learn my lesson from this one and book directly with the airline in the future but I just wish to get this sorted, the extra stress that bravofly is causing is not what I need right now.

Dubai, United Arab...
Destination Expert
for Air Travel
Level Contributor
20,810 posts
41 reviews
59 helpful votes
6. Re: Bravofly scam?
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Good news is that you cancelled your ticket. And you managed to do so with the airline directly.

Did you try to re-book directly with the airline? If they accepted the cancellation from you, they might also accept to interact with you directly to re-book the flight.

UK
Level Contributor
49,560 posts
82 reviews
193 helpful votes
7. Re: Bravofly scam?
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Marc A, in that case I suggest you put a challenge in via your credit card company, in that you bought something, a refundable, changeable ticket, and they didn't provide that by dint of not letting you change it.

It seems you have the paperwork, electronic trail to provide the proof of that.

Good luck.

You might also search out the other Bravofly threads in here, Bravofly customer "service" post in some of those, you can try sending them a private message.

FWIW I am surprised you bought a refundable changeable ticket via a third party, normally if there are any savings that's because there is a trade off for stricter conditions. I very much doubt it would have been any cheaper, indeed I'd expect it to cost more. It wouldn't surprise me if the ticket that Bravofly actually sold you wasn't changeable, whatever they told you.

Let us know how it goes.

Chiasso, Switzerland
Level Contributor
3,293 posts
8. Re: Bravofly scam?
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Dear Marc A,

Please accept our condolences for your loss and we hope that your grandmother is recovering. We would like to apologise for the problems you encountered in processing your flight change request - as you mention it was possible to change your flight we would like to investigate why this was not carried out for you.

Please could you reply to my private message with your 9-digit Bravofly ID.

Kind regards, Sofia

London, United...
Level Contributor
27,179 posts
25 reviews
47 helpful votes
9. Re: Bravofly scam?
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Oh, stop, what a ridiculous post, what did they do, get your card number by telepathy?

Everyone reading this knows you entered your card details and confirmed you wanted to purchase. Of course they charged your card, that's what buying means,

Yoh just wanted to know if you could use electron and will sue then in court? Lol.

Seattle, Washington
Level Contributor
10,856 posts
86 reviews
212 helpful votes
10. Re: Bravofly scam?
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What a crazy post! Yes, I'm sure lots of people are going to send you their personal information - Not.

Sorry, but not sure what the problem was. You had to have chosen a flight, entered your personal information, then your credit card information and purchased. I don't think you will stop anyone from using this company. You found lots of other complaints, didn't you? Did that stop you from using this webpage? Obviously not.

Edited: 9 years ago
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