Advice please - reservations cancellation

[user 6862]

Billing Cycle is typically a month.

That sounds like a long time to wait for a refund. Phoning may be your best bet.

Thanks Ryan, it makes sense now. When I was told one to two billing cycles it could be up to 9 weeks if had just missed one. I'll give it a full 9 weeks and then phone

 

[user 6862]

As if by magic a refund appeared in our card account today, best explanation is Ryan's that billing cycles for Amtrak are at one month intervals so completely satisfied with the time lapse.

But... the agreed refund amount which was put in writing has been reduced by 1/3 . No note, no explanation no contact, just exactly 1/3 has been taken off the USD $ amount. Have written again to ask why. It's not even about the money, it's the high handed way that Amtrak is now behaving after they had been superb over this matter.

We are massive fans of Amtrak, send as many Europeans to ride Amtrak as we can and have never failed to enjoy a journey, so it feels doubly disappointing when you realise that even Amtrak has it's failings.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

My question is this. Is there a known problem with the Customer Support department...

I've never received a useful or actionable reply from writing Amtrak by email. Calling or writing via snail mail is sometimes more successful, but your mileage may vary.

 

[ScouseAndy]

Assuming you had UK based travel insurance for your trip, Wouldnt this cover the remaining 3rd if Amtrak stick to their T&cs? After all your trip was curtailed due to medical reasons and had you remained in the US the insurance would have had to cover the medical bills and by returning to the UK and speaking maximum refunds from amtrak you have mitigated your losses so far so they should pay out

 

[user 6862]

I've never received a useful or actionable reply from writing Amtrak by email. Calling or writing via snail mail is sometimes more successful, but your mileage may vary.

Think you are about right DA, email worked for a while but only after a phone call to start the claim. Then it suddenly stopped just before completion of the refund. No other email has been replied to since. I'll give it a week and then phone again, we'll see.

Assuming you had UK based travel insurance for your trip, Wouldnt this cover the remaining 3rd if Amtrak stick to their T&cs? After all your trip was curtailed due to medical reasons and had you remained in the US the insurance would have had to cover the medical bills and by returning to the UK and speaking maximum refunds from amtrak you have mitigated your losses so far so they should pay out

Evening Andy. We didn't make a claim on our travel insurance as within a couple of days of contacting Amtrak they had agreed a full refund, no need to make an insurance claim so we thought. If the 2/3 we have now received is it we will consider making an insurance claim.

Have to write that to be balanced we had no expectation of getting any refund, thought we would get vouchers perhaps less I think 20% service charge. We were surprise and delighted when they said a full refund would be issued, we didn't ask or press for it, it was offered by Amtrak.
My problem is if you say/write you are going to do something you can't just change your mind, then impose a penalty without informing the customer, and basically go back on your word/contract (offering a full refund) without a good reason. It's the principle now, not the money.

 

[user 6862]

3 or 4 days ago there was a flurry of refund activity from Amtrak, after that settled down the full refund as promised had arrived. Bravo! to Amtrak for keeping to their part of the of the agreement, and thank you CG for taking the trouble to sort it out.
We often think that big business is heartless, but in our situation Amtrak have stood by and looked after their customers in an emergency situation, worth telling others about. Our next long journey was not going to include the USA as we had the option of travelling either east or west back to the UK from our planned journey end point.
After such good service we'll return home via the US and Amtrak, probably spend more with them next time than was refunded.

Thanks for the advice here, can't do this stuff without the help from this forum.