Need Help with Iberia

[Amused212]

I have reached the end of my patience with Iberia Airlines. When COVID forced me to cancel my Camino I wanted a refund for four flights. They would not give me refunds but gave me four vouchers. Over the past two years I have received emails from them about how they extended the voucher so I thought there was no problem. I tried recently to use them as I am doing my Camino this spring. Of the 4, they only recognized one voucher. I have tried calling more times than I can count. Mostly I get a recording that says try later and I get cut off. I did get through 3 times and was hold for varying amounts of time, the longest being 41 minutes. The first time I got through, after a very long wait, the women said yes the vouchers are all good but don't book tickets until I get an email from them which I would get in 7 days. No email, even checked spam. I tried calling again. Got through, talk to someone who said the vouchers should be ok but they wanted to check something. After 20 minutes I was cut off. Tried again, got through, guy said vouchers should be good but he wanted to check something. 41 minutes later I was cut off. Thought screw it, I will use the one voucher. Tried booking the first two flights, started out good, selected my fare, proper amount showed up, was able to enter my one voucher, the math was rightfare minus voucher = amount left I should pay. (Which would have been covered by a voucher but..) I was about to pay, the screen seemed to refresh, and now the amount I should pay is more! The math no longer works. I gave up.

Worst customer service ever. EVER! Any thoughts on how to get through to someone who could actually help?

 

[stevepjq]

I had a similar issue with them in the past. Rather than waste my time, I called up the credit card bank/company and put the transaction in "dispute." That will then result in the bank crediting you the amount of the original transaction and then secondarily, send a notice to the vendor (Iberia) requiring them to provide financial satisfaction or otherwise, resolve the problem. If they do not, the credit to your account remains. In many cases, vendors do not find t worth their while to bother researching. At the end of the day, I got my money back!!!!!

 

[Amused212]

I had a similar issue with them in the past. Rather than waste my time, I called up the credit card bank/company and put the transaction in "dispute." That will then result in the bank crediting you the amount of the original transaction and then secondarily, send a notice to the vendor (Iberia) requiring them to provide financial satisfaction or otherwise, resolve the problem. If they do not, the credit to your account remains. In many cases, vendors do not find t worth their while to bother researching. At the end of the day, I got my money back!!!!!

I did that initially when they wouldn't give me a refund but the credit card company wouldn't do a refund since I received a voucher.

 

[peregrina2000]

I have reached the end of my patience with Iberia Airlines.

I am sorry to hear this, but it is not the first time people have expressed great frustration with Iberia’s lack of phone customer service. This won’t help you out, but for others — I am also from the US, and I always book my Iberia flights through American, so I get an American flight number, etc. (they code share with Iberia). It is frustrating because that means I can’t book my seats till the day of check-in, but I have found that dealing with American in case of problems is much easier.

I hope you get it resolved, @Amused212.

 

[TMcA]

@peregrina2000 always offers excellent advice, so if you booked through American try her suggestion first. If not...

I recently was driven crazy about my U.S. cell phone bill. I finally made an end run -an official complaint through the Federal Trade Commission website. Within 24 hours skilled customer relations representatives were writing me emails correcting the issue (which had to do with fraudulent charges on my account) and following up to make sure I was placated. So...

It will cost you nothing but a little effort to make your complaint to the U.S. Dept. of Transportation documenting Iberia's failure to live up to the promises it made to you. I would guess that as a carrier that enjoys landing rights at U.S. airports, Iberia is subject to some degree of compliance with regulations that protect U.S. persons purchasing tickets on their flights.

Good luck.

Refunds | US Department of Transportation

Travel plans sometimes change and you may want a refund for a purchased airline ticket or other related services such as baggage or seat fees. This page contains useful information to determine whether you are entitled to a refund for air fare or services related to a scheduled flight.

www.transportation.gov

 

[jsalt]

When COVID forced me to cancel my Camino I wanted a refund for four flights. They would not give me refunds but gave me four vouchers.

I am sorry to hear this, and I hate to say this, but I think you may have to write this off.

Iberia is not great on customer service.

When I tried to reuse the voucher they gave me, for the cancelled flight during covid, the value of the voucher was a TENTH of the price I had originally paid .

 

[J Willhaus]

I am sure this won't make you feel any better, but we had similar customer service using Air France last fall. Hung on several times. They canceled flights and there was no way to rebook online-only by phone and no one would answer or if they did we were hung up on. Airlines are going through a rough patch so I expect service will continue to be a problem. Not nearly as fun as when I was a kid and before 9-11.

 

[TaijiPilgrim]

There is a website maintained by ombudsman Christopher Elliott for problems like this. He has a list of contact phone numbers and emails for not just customer service but middle and upper management of all the airlines. Using this list, I once contacted Cathay Pacific head of customer relations regarding an issue and within 3 days I had a response and within 4 days my issue was resolved!

 

[Amused212]

There is a website maintained by ombudsman Christopher Elliott for problems like this. He has a list of contact phone numbers and emails for not just customer service but middle and upper management of all the airlines. Using this list, I once contacted Cathay Pacific head of customer relations regarding an issue and within 3 days I had a response and within 4 days my issue was resolved!

Thanks. I may use this route. I did try one more time (well, several but talked to a person once) after I posted. Again, was on hold for a long time while she "talked to the back office". Once again, they are supposed to send me an email in 7 days. Am not holding my breath. I asked for the number of someone in the back office and she told me they don't talk to customers. It's likely a loss.

 

[Amused212]

I am sorry to hear this, and I hate to say this, but I think you may have to write this off.

Iberia is not great on customer service.

When I tried to reuse the voucher they gave me, for the cancelled flight during covid, the value of the voucher was a TENTH of the price I had originally paid .

Agree, I will likely write this off. Can't believe these people are in business.

 

[Former member 59618]

I would absolutely go the ombudsman route. Just looked it up and wow, he has all the airlines contact info listed (including Iberia). https://www.elliott.org/

*editing to add* if anything, at least submit a help form on the website. Your issue is pretty straightforward; there should be no reason for multiple people to “talk to the back office” and then everyone shrugging their shoulders. Those people don’t know what they’re doing. Iberia is purposely being difficult because they want to wear down the consumer.

 

[Viajatova]

I have reached the end of my patience with Iberia Airlines. When COVID forced me to cancel my Camino I wanted a refund for four flights. They would not give me refunds but gave me four vouchers. Over the past two years I have received emails from them about how they extended the voucher so I thought there was no problem. I tried recently to use them as I am doing my Camino this spring. Of the 4, they only recognized one voucher. I have tried calling more times than I can count. Mostly I get a recording that says try later and I get cut off. I did get through 3 times and was hold for varying amounts of time, the longest being 41 minutes. The first time I got through, after a very long wait, the women said yes the vouchers are all good but don't book tickets until I get an email from them which I would get in 7 days. No email, even checked spam. I tried calling again. Got through, talk to someone who said the vouchers should be ok but they wanted to check something. After 20 minutes I was cut off. Tried again, got through, guy said vouchers should be good but he wanted to check something. 41 minutes later I was cut off. Thought screw it, I will use the one voucher. Tried booking the first two flights, started out good, selected my fare, proper amount showed up, was able to enter my one voucher, the math was rightfare minus voucher = amount left I should pay. (Which would have been covered by a voucher but..) I was about to pay, the screen seemed to refresh, and now the amount I should pay is more! The math no longer works. I gave up.

Worst customer service ever. EVER! Any thoughts on how to get through to someone who could actually help?

Feeling your pain. We had the exact same experience. Booked our Camino 2 years ago, had to cancel due to Covid. They extended our vouchers for booking into July for travel through 2022. Worst customer service. I called what was advertised as Iberia’s Los Angeles office and finally got a helpful agent…or so I thought. They had to convert our two vouchers into one voucher but in doing so they pushed the expiration date back to April 15th. We had success by commenting on Twitter and Facebook on the Iberia pages. We commented many times on every one of Iberia’s posts. They told us to private message them and about a week later they fixed it. After they corrected it we removed the negative comments. You do need the vouchers combined into one voucher to book tickets together. We were able to use the full voucher amount and headed to the Camino this spring. Good luck!!

 

[lt56ny]

I am sorry to hear this, but it is not the first time people have expressed great frustration with Iberia’s lack of phone customer service. This won’t help you out, but for others — I am also from the US, and I always book my Iberia flights through American, so I get an American flight number, etc. (they code share with Iberia). It is frustrating because that means I can’t book my seats till the day of check-in, but I have found that dealing with American in case of problems is much easier.

I hope you get it resolved, @Amused212.

I have two question about seats. I often use Iberia for my flights. This year was the first time I experienced the problems with telephone customer service with Iberia. I too found it impossible to get through to them.
Are the prices on American the same as Iberia? Secondly I always pay extra for an exit row seat. I would lose my mind for an 11 hour flight from Mexico City to Madrid. I always check to make sure an exit row seat is available before I finish my booking. Do you know if I can book my seat if I wish to pay extra for an Iberian flight through the American website?

 

[Viajatova]

I had a similar issue with them in the past. Rather than waste my time, I called up the credit card bank/company and put the transaction in "dispute." That will then result in the bank crediting you the amount of the original transaction and then secondarily, send a notice to the vendor (Iberia) requiring them to provide financial satisfaction or otherwise, resolve the problem. If they do not, the credit to your account remains. In many cases, vendors do not find t worth their while to bother researching. At the end of the day, I got my money back!!!!!

We tried that but it was past the six month date to do that. Great that you were able to Do that.

 

[casario]

I have reached the end of my patience with Iberia Airlines. When COVID forced me to cancel my Camino I wanted a refund for four flights. They would not give me refunds but gave me four vouchers. Over the past two years I have received emails from them about how they extended the voucher so I thought there was no problem. I tried recently to use them as I am doing my Camino this spring. Of the 4, they only recognized one voucher. I have tried calling more times than I can count. Mostly I get a recording that says try later and I get cut off. I did get through 3 times and was hold for varying amounts of time, the longest being 41 minutes. The first time I got through, after a very long wait, the women said yes the vouchers are all good but don't book tickets until I get an email from them which I would get in 7 days. No email, even checked spam. I tried calling again. Got through, talk to someone who said the vouchers should be ok but they wanted to check something. After 20 minutes I was cut off. Tried again, got through, guy said vouchers should be good but he wanted to check something. 41 minutes later I was cut off. Thought screw it, I will use the one voucher. Tried booking the first two flights, started out good, selected my fare, proper amount showed up, was able to enter my one voucher, the math was rightfare minus voucher = amount left I should pay. (Which would have been covered by a voucher but..) I was about to pay, the screen seemed to refresh, and now the amount I should pay is more! The math no longer works. I gave up.

Worst customer service ever. EVER! Any thoughts on how to get through to someone who could actually help?

I too have issues with Iberia! I purchased tickets to slow walk the Camino Frances April 1-June 4 and found out a week later I had bladder cancer with 6 weekly treatments and another biopsy between April 1 and April 12.
I called and they gave me a email to send documentation which I did. After several weeks of not hearing back, I re emailed to inquire about the refund and was told that they only gave refunds if you were in the hospital. I explained that I would be in the hospital for the biopsy but they refused refund unless i had a letter from the hospital that I was in the hospital.

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