LOWCOSTHOLIDAYS !

[Raithstar]

My mate and family are staying in the Mirachoro just now , returned to the room yesterday to find the door locked , went to reception to report not getting into room they have stayed in for the last week and were told that LOWCOSTHOLIDAYS had went bust and if they wanted to continue there holiday they would have to pay €1100 . Failing that they had to pay for the days they had already had and only then they would get into room to got their belongings . My mate says there are a lot of young couples in tears having no money to pay .

[algarve123]

Sad situation.

We lost 3400 euro we paid for accomodation for our holiday in Carvoeiro in August. Got it booked again but still massively out of pocket.

Our flights were the only thing that had been paid by low cost holidays even though we paid full amount up front to them 7 months ago.

[Raithstar]

Sad situation.

We lost 3400 euro we paid for accomodation for our holiday in Carvoeiro in August. Got it booked again but still massively out of pocket.

Our flights were the only thing that had been paid by low cost holidays even though we paid full amount up front to them 7 months ago.

Sorry to hear that , it's terrible that they were still taking money and promoting a sale up until a few days ago .
Did you pay with credit card ? Should be covered if you did .

[alf1956]

It's a disgrace that these travel companies are allowed to get away with it time after time you hear about them taking customers money sometimes up to the day before they go bust & you cant tell me that they had no idea that they were going under. Yet again it is the normal working folk who loose their hard earned holiday which is heart breaking for them & so wrong !

[algarve123]

Yes raithstar thanks, we purchased with card. We put our application in this morning to have the money returned.

Shocking to hear of people losing their rooms whilst on holiday.

I received an e-mail from low cost holiday friday morning offering 60% off deals and they announced they were going out of business at 5 o clock that evening.

Shocking behavior, we have had no holidays from work since christmas so 4 weeks in Carvoeiro was something we were really looking forward too.

Glad that we were able to keep the booking but it caused a lot of stress and for now we are out of pocket.

My heart goes out to people that are currently on holidays having to deal with all this. Nobody needs that stress on their break.

[joeysoap]

Terrible for holidaymakers who paid for their holidays and now find themselves in this position. Are holidaymakers who booked using their debit card protected ?


Irish bookings seemed to be covered here.

http://www.aviationreg.ie/

[algarve123]

Terrible for holidaymakers who paid for their holidays and now find themselves in this position. Are holidaymakers who booked using their debit card protected ?


Irish bookings seemed to be covered here.

http://www.aviationreg.ie/

Correct joeysoap, we are Irish and have been told that we should be covered by this. We have our application sent in and are waiting to hear back.

We also enquired at our bank and I believe that 'chargeback' on debit cards may cover this also.

[sunman]

we're caught in this mess too, booked a hotel on 3rd April with a deposit, paid the final on April 17th and you hear that the hotel never saw a penny so we've had to rebook & pay more as the Euro has moved,

I read that the staff haven't been paid either so it's difficult to get angry at the nice sounding lady on the phone who took our payment,

let's hope we see this Paul Evans bloke up in front of the same MP's who are grilling Phillip Green (I stripped him of his gong when I put him in the sinbin),

just info; both the travel insurance Co. & Visa have said we're covered so that's a relief but I doubt we'll be seeing much dosh in the next 6 months while they sort it all out

[ceh]

So sorry to hear of people caught up in this collapse. I've looked at holidays through lowcostholidays over the last few years but never booked - I was shocked what I saw they'd gone bust when I looked at a link for the website earlier this week. Outrageous to be still promoting deals so close to the failure

[algarve123]

I agree Ceh. I even read an article where one woman had her holiday cancelled when the company went into administration on the Friday and then received an e-mail on the Sunday from Lowcostholidays asking for feedback on their service and offering a £100 voucher for taking part in the survey.

After ruining peoples holidays and taking their money the very minimum they could do is ensure their automated e-mails are not still being issued to people that effectively feel robbed of their money.

I was annoyed having received an e-mail from them the Friday morning they closed offering discounts, I cant imagine how annoyed that woman was hearing from them 2 days after she lost her holiday.

[smudger]

From what I've read on this forum, in the press and what I've heard from a friend who had booked flights/hotel to Olhao, the actions of the owners of the company verges on fraud, they knowingly acted in a manner that would result in financial loss of others. And the fact they moved the company from the UK to Spain means the UK authorities can't investigate the actions of the directors/owners. Bring back public floggings!

[alf1956]

How many times has this scenario happened before & it seems that the company/directors get away with it & more often than not they set up another company straight away under a new name with different directors but with the same crooks working the company from behind the scenes. It appears that you can get away with being an unscrupulous Bastard if you know the right people & how to play the system the same as Phillip Green did when he robbed those poor BHS workers off their pensions & has the audacity to go out & buy a multi million pound yacht !

[Polli62]

Seems also according to one of the tripadvisor forums that lastminute.com also sold lowcostholidays within their packages and many have been affected by that also. Many of the people were under the impression that they booked with Lastminute.com and they would be covered, but not so. Disgraceful. Even Travelrepublic use Lowcostbeds (part of same company) for booking accommodation so should imagine many folks will be affected with that too.

[PTBUXTON]

Someone I know who paid via a visa debit card,is currently in the process of getting his money back for a holiday he booked for this coming xmas,its called the re charge scheme? or something similar details I believe are on the Martin Lewis site.

[algarve123]

Someone I know who paid via a visa debit card,is currently in the process of getting his money back for a holiday he booked for this coming xmas,its called the re charge scheme? or something similar details I believe are on the Martin Lewis site.

We have had our money returned through our visa debit card a few days ago. The woman in our bank called it 'chargeback'. We were absolutely delighted to get it back, the process only took a few days after we filled in the application. It was refunded straight back into our account.