Very sad about Monarch - they have been our airline of choice for 15 years - I hope someone else will step in or I fear prices will increase

Yes, really sad. Have just spent much of today trying to help a family who were due to be staying in our villa for the October half term holiday - alternative flights are now priced at double what they originally paid - so they may decide to cancel the whole holiday.

After several months of gall bladder probs and recent removal, we decided on a treat and about 10 days ago booked a week at the refurbished Tivoli, flying out Oct 17 with Monarch. And last Monday, we woke to find they had gone bust. Luckily for us, cancellation of the hotel booking and airport transfer came without any penalty, and PayPal have assured me that the cost of flights will be refunded to my credit card on about the 15th. Much less luck for the 2000+ employees who woke to find they were unemployed.

I suppose we could have re-booked with EJ, though by Monday afternoon, their flights from Luton were about twice what we'd paid Monarch. That leaves EJ with a monopoly to Faro, until another airline possibly steps in?

An acquaintance told me he has 3 cousins working for Monarch in Luton. Sad news indeed.

We always used to use Monarch but for for some unknown reason stopped doing so apart from one flight this summer. We flew from Luton on Wednesday for the first time for a number of years and it was sad to see the Monarch buildings, including a banner celebrating an Anniversary and their planes parked up at the airport

My daughter was cabin crew for Monarch, she arrived in Manchester at 3.30am from Tel Aviv all the crew were told to go to the office on arrival.
They were told there and then that they had no jobs and could attend at meeting at 8.30am at the Hilton, Manchester.
Fortunately she was finishing her contract on the 21st October, her colleagues are devastated and it not only affects them but Swiss Port,
Catering Services and ground staff. They were told that the Monarch slots will be auctioned off and the money gained used to pay off
creditors, apparently staff salaries are not high on the agenda!!

Yes great shame - what with Mr O Leary acting as a god as usual, the hol airline business seems a bit dodgy at the moment. My daughtser should have come home last monday on Monarch but got an extra day whilst another flt was organised. I should have been back out 24th but now have to take a later ryanair flt - not sure if I can get a refund as the Monarch flt was only 34.99.

We booked with Monarch on the day before they went out of business, luckily we paid by Credit Card so we got our money back. We had flown with Monarch for the past 15+ years and found them to be very efficient even when a suitcase went missing they delivered it to our Villa the next day. Refuse to fly with Ryanair from our past experiences, so looks like another Airline next year.

maccasa wrote:Yes great shame - what with Mr O Leary acting as a god as usual, the hol airline business seems a bit dodgy at the moment. My daughtser should have come home last monday on Monarch but got an extra day whilst another flt was organised. I should have been back out 24th but now have to take a later ryanair flt - not sure if I can get a refund as the Monarch flt was only 34.99.

You should do as I understand it they were ATOL protected upto the day they went under.

Monarch flight bookings made since 15th December 2016 are not ATOL protected. The only avenues for refund are credit or debit card providers and claims on those travel insurance policies which provide cover against scheduled airline failure.

Package holiday bookings were ATOL protected until the day they went under.

T

Algarve Eagle wrote:Monarch flight bookings made since 15th December 2016 are not ATOL protected. The only avenues for refund are credit or debit card providers and claims on those travel insurance policies which provide cover against scheduled airline failure.

Package holiday bookings were ATOL protected until the day they went under.

T

It is probably the Package holiday bit that I heard on the news.

My friends and I booked with Monarch in July 4 return tickets cost £472 from Manchester, JET 2 at the time quoted £615 ish,so we went with Monarch ha ha They have now gone down the you know what,we did pay via Paypal and will have to wait until 1st Nov to see if we will be refunded I'm hopeful after reading Martin Lewis's web site.Anyway we have rebooked with Easyjet from Liverpool total cost £382 with an extra day!!

And did I read somewhere that the CEO of Monarch started up another airline business the day after Monarch went bust? Takes a while to start a new business so he obviously had started his 'escape plan' in advance of going bust. Can't find any Smilie that resembles an ar+=.

bruce wrote:My daughter was cabin crew for Monarch, she arrived in Manchester at 3.30am from Tel Aviv all the crew were told to go to the office on arrival.
They were told there and then that they had no jobs and could attend at meeting at 8.30am at the Hilton, Manchester.
Fortunately she was finishing her contract on the 21st October, her colleagues are devastated and it not only affects them but Swiss Port,
Catering Services and ground staff. They were told that the Monarch slots will be auctioned off and the money gained used to pay off
creditors, apparently staff salaries are not high on the agenda!!

I also heard that staff were asked to attend the meeting at Manchester and those who could not attend (most) were given a premium rate number to call and one pilot run up a £50 bill to be told he had lost his job!

Paypal refunded me £94 this morning, not certain but to claim off a credit card I think the transaction had to be over £100? Paypal from now on for me

Paypal settled our claim yesterday all £488