My complaint:
My name is Edward , and I am a 75 year old English pensioner.
Last year I flew with a reputable company called KLM Airlines from Sofia, Bulgaria to Entebbe, Uganda, arriving, as my visa shows on 11.03.2021. As it transpired, I had some business to attend to at the Bulgarian Embassy in Pretoria. South Africa, and so I had the extreme misfortune of choosing Opodo from the internet, to book a return flight from Entebbe, to Johannesburg departing on 19.04.2021 for myself and my wife, with the return flight leaving Johannesburg on 02.05.2021. I paid for this journey with my Starling Bank debit card and the cost was £568.89. As coincidence, (OR NOT) I made this booking with my phone on 09.04.2021. NINTH of April! Nine must be the favourite number for this company! As I now have found, Opodo, Travelink, Edreams,GoVoyages, and Liligo are ONE AND THE SAME COMPANY! More coincidence to be seen!
We departed Entebbe on 19.04.2021, and after completing my task at the Bulgarian Embassy, flew back to Entebbe on 02.05.2021 as my visa stamps can show. All was well until I noticed on my online banking that there was a pending payment to Opodo for the sum of £59.99. This took me completely by surprise as I had not had any further dealing with this company after the initial booking, and I believed that this was a reputable company and that a quick email to their customer services would clear up the matter. I found the company website and found to my utter dismay that they did not have a customer service section, and instead operated a self help system where the customer is given a set of option, none of which cover money taken from a previous customers debit card without their express permission. I therefore contacted my bank, who told me that because the payment was PENDING, nothing could be done, and that the merchant would refund the money to my account once they realised a mistake had been made. WRONG! On the NINTH (coincidence) of May 2021, the payment was taken by Opodo, never to be seen again. Once I returned to my home in Bulgaria, I once again tried to contact Opodo, to no avail, and eventually, put it down to experience and noted never to use this company again. I sent an email to them but was returned with some sort of error message. However, I am not a millionaire, I am just a 75 year old Englishman endeavouring to live a peaceful retirement in Bulgaria, and so, the sum of £59.99 represents 30% of my weekly pension. I am so annoyed!
I noticed yesterday, 09.05.2022 that ONCE AGAIN there is a payment pending to EDREAMS this time for the sum of……wait for it…… £59.99. What a strange coincidence! Edreams, by the way, have a similar customer service department. NON EXISTENT! I again contacted my bank who again told me that there was nothing they could do about it! How good is that? I will of course be closing my account with Starling Bank as obviously, someone at OpodoEdreams is fraudulently getting money by way of debit card records which should have been destroyed after each successful transaction! I will be posting this on Trustpilot, GetHuman, and Complain.biz. I will also send it to their LEGAL DEPARTMENT, if indeed it exists away from the printed page or is perhaps a hypothetical reassurance of integrity! Let us see if customerservice-en@contact.edreams.com is indeed a service or just a figment of my imagination!
Suggested solution:
Reimburse and compensate me for my time in trying to resolve this disgraceful occurrence
