Viking River Cruise Rip Off

[JVilleGal]

Sadly this is a very complicated issue and an elderly traveler would have no idea about the fine print if it was not throughly explained to them.

 

 

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In fact I do not believe a front line customer service rep would even understand the complications of this entire picture.

 

 

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[dsrdsrdsr]

In England there are newspaper financial pages which have a resident expert whose job is to take the customer's side when the institution is not playing fair or not doing its job. I dare say there are US equivalents - could one of them be interested? It's cheaper than going to court, and threatens Viking with worse publicity.

[JVilleGal]

In England there are newspaper financial pages which have a resident expert whose job is to take the customer's side when the institution is not playing fair or not doing its job. I dare say there are US equivalents - could one of them be interested? It's cheaper than going to court, and threatens Viking with worse publicity.

 

 

See Post 11 - already gave him info on the very Best consumer advocate.

 

 

 

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[cruiseco]

Let's deal with this first

Cancel for any reason from TravelGard only covers at 75% if you cancel before 48 hours of departure. That's it. After 48 hours,,, no CFAR.

 

That is true of the retail policies TG sells to the general public. But these plans that are designed for a travel supplier's clients (like Viking) can be so different they're hardly recognizable as a TG plan. The TG plan being sold here had no CFAR provision at all. That came from Viking independently (their optional "cancellation fee waiver") and had no 48-hour black-out exclusion.

 

 

Had the Wilsons cancelled for a "covered" reason. which it appears that it very well could have been a covered reason, TravelGard would have reimbursed at 100% cash refund.

 

It appears that what may have happened due to not understanding things,,, the Wilsons called Viking, and out of the goodness of their heart, they offered the Wilsons future cruise vouchers.

 

Viking did nothing more or less than what they were legally required to under the optional "Cancellation Fee Waiver they (not TG) sold these clients (certainly "goodness of their heart" had nothing to do with it. They had no choice.)

[klfrodo]

That is true of the retail policies TG sells to the general public. But these plans that are designed for a travel supplier's clients (like Viking) can be so different they're hardly recognizable as a TG plan. The TG plan being sold here had no CFAR provision at all. That came from Viking independently (their optional "cancellation fee waiver") and had no 48-hour black-out exclusion.

 

 

 

Viking did nothing more or less than what they were legally required to under the optional "Cancellation Fee Waiver they (not TG) sold these clients (certainly "goodness of their heart" had nothing to do with it. They had no choice.)

 

Thank you for the clarification

[Jeffrey Wilson]

They booked, bought the travel insurance policy, and paid for everything directly through Viking. In fact they were told that they had to use the insurance company that Viking recommended; for the first booking it was

Travel Guard, the 2nd Booking it was: Trip Mate

 

They never received anything in writing from Viking on the first cancellation, other than receiving the travel vouchers which they immediately used to book their 2nd reservation with. Another thing that I find difficult to believe is that when they called Trip Mate and notified them of mom's accident and the need to cancel the 2nd reservation, Trip Mate said that they would receive their refund vouchers directly from Viking, so apparently Trip Mate was unaware of Vikings Cancellation Policy which I find really hard to believe.

 

How should I proceed from this point? Any recommendations would be greatly appreciate.

 

Thanks again for taking the time to respond to our issue.

 

J

[JVilleGal]

Have you been denied in writing by Viking??

Did they receive anything WITH the travel vouchers that listed the terms of their use?

 

See post 11 with contact info for Chris Elliott

 

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Edited January 28, 2015 by JVilleGal

[YoungDubFan]

I think this illustrates a few points. 1) Never book your travel insurance through the travel company / cruise line that you are travelling on. You always want to have a separate / independent insurance policy. 2) This is not unusual behavior for Viking. They may have the most amount of ships on the rivers, but their customer service tends to be very bad and whenever there are problems, Viking customers tend to be the most upset. 3) Viking should never have told your mother to take vouchers instead of a full refund. They should have given her a 100% cash refund and then she could choose to rebook with Viking or another cruise line.

 

You may want to have her reach out to her credit card company and see if she can file any type of dispute with them. I'm assuming she used a credit card to pay for the trip originally - even if in installments. This is a reason to use credit cards - extra protection.

 

You can always try to escalate the dispute up to Viking management. From this point on, you need to have all of your correspondence with Viking via e-mail or regular mail. You need a paper trail. I know that a phone call seems to be easy, but you have no proof of anything that is said. You can even do a chat via the web and take screen shots.

 

Good luck. If anything, this serves as a reminder to do homework before booking an expensive vacation. There is a separate River Cruising section of these boards and they are filled with complaints against Viking.

[JVilleGal]

Yep!!!

 

 

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[Laughing Angel]

Continue to pursue this with Viking, and document EVERYTHING. Make sure all contacts, conversations, documents, etc. are in order to complete the narrative, and absolutely contact Chris Elliot at the link below.

 

I hope your Mom is healing and feeling better and that you are able to get this resolved to your parents satisfaction.

 

Contact Chris Elliott

 

http://elliott.org/about/

 

He is a consumer advocate, though he will have expected that you have taken many steps in writing (paper trail) before he steps in. So much of the advise given above needs to be followed first.

 

You need to do more than talk to just one person in CS on the phone. You need to kick it up the chain of command and also have Travel Guard turn you down too.

 

Good luck and let us know how it works out! Hope your mom is doing better now.

 

 

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[Jeffrey Wilson]

They did not get anything in writing, the vouchers did have some vague terms on the back in small print but when the Viking Rep Sold them another insurance policy covering the 2nd cruise, they thought they were covered.

 

They booked both cruises and bought both insurance plans directly through Viking.

 

I have contacted Chris Elliot with our story and am waiting to hear back from him.

 

Thanks again for all of your responses.

 

The Wilson Family

[Laughing Angel]

Good luck to you. Please come back and let us know how the situation (hopefully) gets resolved.

[JVilleGal]

"Vague terms on the back of the certificates" this is a problem.

 

However, the trip insurance that Viking sold them the second time??? Was if for the FULL value on the second trip? Or the lessor value, because the vouchers had no value?

 

If it was for the full value then I would think that is your "Gotcha", they can't sell trip insurance for the full value and then turn around and say those vouchers have no value.

 

Good luck in dealing with this mess!

 

 

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[NMLady]

"Vague terms on the back of the certificates" this is a problem.

 

However, the trip insurance that Viking sold them the second time??? Was if for the FULL value on the second trip? Or the lessor value, because the vouchers had no value?

 

If it was for the full value then I would think that is your "Gotcha", they can't sell trip insurance for the full value and then turn around and say those vouchers have no value.

 

Good luck in dealing with this mess!

 

 

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That is my thinking too. If the second voucher had no value, then why charge for insurance? Maybe another call to TripMate saying no voucher is being given by Viking so want value of cruise.

 

I am glad you reached out to Christopher Elliott as well. He has helped lots of people.

[6rugrats]

 

If it was for the full value then I would think that is your "Gotcha", they can't sell trip insurance for the full value and then turn around and say those vouchers have no value.

 

I am not sure. You can insure your trip for $10,000, but if after you cancel your loss is only $100, that's all you will collect.

 

A complicated story and it will be interesting to see what happens.

[JVilleGal]

I am not sure. You can insure your trip for $10,000, but if after you cancel your loss is only $100, that's all you will collect.

 

 

 

A complicated story and it will be interesting to see what happens.

 

 

Yes you can but in this case it's Viking who sold them the Travel Insurance and that customer service agent would have also had complete details on the "real value" of their trip and the lack of value of the vouchers.

 

So Viking gained (by way of a higher commission) by selling insurance based on an inflated value, but then denied that value when time to collect on the insurance???

 

I agree this is a complicated mess! Thank goodness the OP has reached out to Chris Elliott. It does not appear that the op has escalated this issue up the chain of command or even gotten anything in writing yet....

 

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Edited January 30, 2015 by JVilleGal

[SuiteTraveler]

The OP's parents credit card company may be an extremely powerful advocate in getting this issue resolved, perhaps, much more quickly than if the OP were to approach Viking himself. I would suggest that the OP contact the credit card company's fraud resolution department, explain the situation with his parents present while he is on the phone so that the credit card company can confirm with his parents that it is alright to speak to him about his parents credit card. Ask the company what they can do to help with this issue.

 

I found this information about Viking River Cruises that may be of assistance in getting this issue put before the President of the company:

 

Main Phone Number: 800-304-9616

 

Website: http://www.vikingrivercruises.com/us/

 

Complaint Department Number: 800-304-9616

 

Complaint Department Webpage: https://www.vikingrivercruises.com/us/contact/index.aspx

 

Executive: Torstein Hagen, President and CEO

 

Corporate Address: 5700 Canoga Ave, Suite 200, Woodland Hills, CA 91367

 

Corporate Phone Number: 818-227-1234

 

Corporate Fax Number: 818-227-1237

 

It appears that the reservations and sales department for Viking are located in Boston with the corporate offices are located in Woodland Hills, CA. I believe the OP may need to escalate this issue up the chain of command at Viking from Boston to Woodland Hills. LinkedIn (website) contains many Viking employees including Michele Saegesser, Vice President, Sales, The Americas at Viking River Cruises who appears to also be in California. Surely one of the senior executives in this company would assist the OP where the regular customer service reps cannot.

[JVilleGal]

This purchase was made too long ago for the credit card company to help them... Of course that is just my understanding of how "credit card disputes" are handled. I believe you have 60 days from when the charge first shows on your monthly statement. This charge I believe is well over (original charge) a year old?? Or the bulk of a the charge from the First booking.