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When Is A Flight Cancelled?

My husband and I each have Delta flights in April. Mine leaves on April 13th from Portland to Amsterdam and on via KLM to Prague. His leaves on April 23rd from Portland to Amsterdam and on via KLM to Budapest. We both return May 2nd from Budapest to Amsterdam via KLM and home via Delta. I purchased both sets of flights directly through Delta.

Currently Delta's own news site shows that there will be no transatlantic flights from Portland in April. Nor does their website offer any transatlantic flights from Portland.

If I check our flight status, it shows the flights as on time. But my passenger status on the first leg is listed as "unconfirmed". Today KLM sent me an email cancelling my husband's Amsterdam to Budapest flight and offering us a credit. What the amount of that credit would be is not named, and as I paid for both his round trip tickets for a single price from Delta, I don't know what the KLM leg cost.

My current plan is to send KLM an email telling them that as our flight was purchased from Delta, we will only deal directly with Delta. Then I go on waiting for Delta to admit they have cancelled the flights?

Is there a better way to handle this? The goal is a refund for the flights.

Posted by
650 posts

No I haven't asked Delta yet. Delta asks that people wait until 72 hours before flights to cancel or modify. I suppose I could call anyway.

Posted by
7453 posts

You can also handle it all online. Just go onto your reservation, click to cancel, continue on through the process, they will prompt you letting you know if your cancellation is allowed, near the end you can either choose a credit, or continue onto an exception form to get a refund.

Posted by
4495 posts

Don’t email KLM.

Wait till you get a cancellation email from Delta. Then you can call, use Twitter (@Delta), or do nothing and just wait for a refund which is automatic for cancellations.

Posted by
2699 posts

Don’t email, don’t bother with what your flight status says they are all way behind. Don’t try to finesse this. Get on the phone with Delta. Tell them what you are seeing on the website, you want a refund. I think you’ll find that more direct and, from what I’m reading about Delta, you’ll get your money back.

Posted by
135 posts

I would call and see if your flights have already been canceled. None of my flights showed us canceled but all four of them were canceled.

Posted by
10120 posts

Delta has only three flight to Europe in April, from Atlanta and New York. Your flight has been canceled.
So just call them.

Posted by
1075 posts

In a related question, what do you all think about my situation? In summer, I have two flights, one from Atlanta to JFK, and one from JFK to London. I have a bad feeling that those seem like some of the few flights that actually may NOT get canceled even though I personally have no intention on getting on them. I wonder why my strategy should be in getting a refund for a flight that may still actually happen?

Posted by
650 posts

Update:

KLM has sent us two more emails cancelling both Budepest to Amsterdam legs on May 2nd.

I took Anne and Beth's good advice and called Delta. It took about an hour including waiting 20 minutes for a callback and thirty minutes on muszac hold.

The Delta agent agreed my April 13th flight has been cancelled by Delta and has sent an email confirming my refund. He said the refund will credit my card in about seven days. [Edit: the refund confirmation email says they are refunding not only the flight cost but also the seat reservation fees.]

But he insisted that my husband's April 24th flight is still on and that KLM's system tells them that the KLM has not cancelled. He inferred that the emails from KLM might be fake despite having the flight details correct. He added that the Portland to Amsterdam flight is overbooked. I suggested we could volunteer not to fly for a full refund. He didn't think that was funny. So I did nothing about that flight. We will wait to see if it is cancelled.

Posted by
564 posts

Two weeks ago Delta website told me to wait for the 72 hour window. My ticket is insured anyway so I'm not concerned.
The Delta bundle is operated by Air France, then Transavia, then KLM. As it was all purchased from Delta I don't expect hiccups, but one never knows.

I expected my RS May 10 tour to Spain to be cancelled so I just waited and I received my cancelled notification this week.
But I still won't do anything about Delta until May 4. My (AirFrance)BOS-CDG/CDG-BCN is May 8 as I added 2 pre tour nights to my travel. Return is May 24 (Transavia) SVQ-AMS// (KLM) AMS-BOS.

If there's hiccups I'll share them here.

Posted by
2699 posts

My ticket is insured anyway so I'm not concerned.

I’d be curious to hear about this. I checked my travel insurance and found if a tour operator cancels other expenses are not covered. This was an exclusion buried deeply in the policy. All policies are different. Mine is terrible!

Posted by
484 posts

I posted my positive experience today with Delta Airlines under another topic: Airline Refunds.

I canceled my April 20 tickets online last week and got an ecredit, but encouraged by reports on this forum I called and asked for a refund instead which they issued. I opted for a call back instead of holding and got called within 25 minutes.

Posted by
2916 posts

I called Lufthansa yesterday and cancelled my flights, which were to start in 2 weeks. I didn't get an email notifying me that 2 legs had been cancelled (although I did get an email at one point saying our seats had been changed), but they showed as cancelled on my itinerary on the Lufthansa web site. When I called, I was only on hold for about 10-15 minutes. And there was no issue about waiting until 72 hours before. The woman was very pleasant, and when she pulled up my record she immediately said that several of my flights had been cancelled. After first listening to the voucher alternative, I said I still wanted a refund, so she said fine. Although she did say it could take up to a month to process it. I can deal with that; I think it's likely that Lufthansa will still be in business then.

Posted by
3586 posts

Jen, I posted my experience in Transportation, thread, “thanks Delta.” I should add that, today, I received an email from American Express that the refunds have been credited back to my account. Less than a week for all of it.
I also advise that if you bought from Delta, just communicate with them. That’s what I did, even though the canceled leg of our flight was on KLM. That made no difference. Bought from Delta; refunded by Delta.
Now, if they could only add a little leg room . . .

Posted by
650 posts

Another update. Sunday my husband's passenger status went from confirmed to blank. I called Delta Monday morning. They have agreed to refund the ticket and I have an email confirming that. In the wee hours Monday night we got an email saying the flight was cancelled and that we have an ecredit. I'm not going to call about that. I'm assuming that we have the refund and that the second email is just an over exclusive form email.

We are pretty pleased with Delta.