The travel agent will take 10% of the ticket value as a handling charge for retrieving the refund. This is a new charge brought in purely as a result of the virus situation. I believe this charge is unreasonable but don’t actually know if the contract between me and the travel agent allowed them to introduce additional charges willy nilly. Their website suggests that they can.
“ Refunds: Some airlines are offering a refund. You can still choose a credit note if you prefer. Where you don't wish to accept a credit note and the airline is allowing refunds, you may ask us to request a refund from the airline on your behalf.
We will pass on the refund to you within 14 days of us having received it from the airline, but please note that we have no control over how long the airline takes to process your refund request.
Some airlines have now introduced a manual process for requesting refunds instead of their usual process. This requires us to complete an application form to request your refund, which significantly adds to the time and cost of requesting a refund on your behalf. We have increased the size of our refunds team to complete these application forms, which we typically lodge with the airline within 7 days of your refund request. However, some airlines are anticipating taking 4 to 6 months to process your refund following receipt of the application form. This timeframe is not something which we control..
As we incur a cost in processing refunds on behalf of our customers, our terms and conditions allow us to charge an administration fee to cover these costs. Therefore, once we receive your refund from the airline, we will forward this on to you less our administration fee for processing the refund. This administration fee will be 10% of the per ticket value, subject to a maximum amount of £75 per ticket. We know that waiting for a refund is frustrating and we really sympathize. Therefore, in the event that the airline takes longer than 4 months to process your refund request, we will waive our administration fee as a gesture of goodwill.”
The airline is obligated to issue a refund if requested but will not refund the ticket value directly to me, only to the travel agent. They did give me the airline website for agents. On there, it says
“ Refunds
Some customers may be entitled to a refund if their ticket and EMD originated in the USA, UK, Switzerland, or European Union, and their flight has been cancelled by Etihad Airways.
Simply submit your refund request via “Refunds Applications” through the BSP link. ARC agents will need to send an email to ARCRefunds@etihad.ae. Please note refunds can take up to 4 weeks to process. Don’t forget, you can also change the date of your customer’s flight for free or offer Etihad Credit for future travel.”
That doesn’t sound like much work to get 10% of the refund value.
According to the peanut gallery, what should be my next step?