XL refunds 'due by end of summer'

By Dominic Laurie
BBC Working Lunch

The collapse of XL led to thousands of people being stranded abroad

People waiting for refunds from last year's collapse of the XL travel group should get their money by the end of the summer, the regulator says.

The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) had originally told the BBC's Working Lunch programme that the intention had been to refund people by the end of April.

But it says "legal" issues meant this deadline was missed and the process ended up taking much longer than hoped.

The CAA says it expects more than 80,000 people are awaiting refunds.

We have a plans to complete all the claims, at least all those that are payable, by the end of the summer David Moesli, Civil Aviation Authority

The XL travel group fell into administration in September last year, stranding tens of thousands of holidaymakers abroad. At the time, the company was the UK's third-largest package holiday group.

'Still out of pocket'

Andrew Orchard is one of those still waiting for money. He was due to fly to Kos with his wife the day after XL went bust. He has waited for eight months for a refund - with no answers.

"The problem is, we've booked this year's holiday, and we are still out of pocket," he says. "We think it may still be several months before we see our money, if at all."

Mr and Mrs Corke from West Sussex, who are both pensioners, are also still waiting. "It'd be nice to think we can get our own money back while there is still time," they write.

Andrew Orchard is one XL customer still waiting for his refund

In January this year, the CAA told the BBC that these claims would be paid by the end of April. That deadline came and went, with tens of thousands still waiting for their money.

"Of the 60,000 claims we have had in, we have paid almost two-thirds of those," says David Moesli, deputy director for consumer protection at the CAA. "We have plans to complete all the claims, at least all those that are payable, by the end of the summer."

Asked why they had given their earlier prediction in January of completing all of this by the end of April, he said: "We probably hoped that we were out of the legal forest at that time. But I can say now that there are no legal issues that stop us paying claims.

"The only delay in claims at the moment is actually working through the numbers we have, and dealing with any documentation that may be missing."

Delays

The CAA estimates that more than 80,000 passengers are still waiting for their money eight months on.

This consists of 22,000 claims the CAA has already received but that are still waiting payment, and an estimated further 12-14,000 claims it hasn't received details of yet. The CAA estimates that on average, each claim involves two-and-a-half people.

Of those claims that it has not yet received details of, the CAA says it thinks many of these will still be lodged with travel agents waiting for processing.

However, ABTA, the travel agents trade body, says it is not "aware of any problems with travel agents getting details to the CAA. The major issue with the XL failure has been the magnitude of the failure, which is why it has taken so long for some customers to get refunded."

The CAA says that both it and the government are keen to learn the lessons of all this - and improve the compensation system.