United has a position as well though. It sold two seats. That means there are two less seats in inve

Gay Swope owns a mom-and-pop travel agency called Travel World International in Lorain, Ohio. It s the kind of shop a travel century park hotel bangkok advocate like me might refer you to for the kind of personalized service you won t find online.
Last August, a client called to book an airline ticket for his daughter century park hotel bangkok and her son. He stated he lived here in Lorain, while she lived in California. This was an emergency, his daughter needed to travel that same day to Florida century park hotel bangkok due to the death of a friend. The client gave me his credit card information, home address century park hotel bangkok and phone number. I issued the tickets on US Airlines and sent him the receipt.
In November, US Airways issued us a debit memo for the two tickets totaling $1,528. They explained the owner of that credit card disputed century park hotel bangkok the charges. century park hotel bangkok During our investigation of this matter, we discovered that the client that called to purchase the tickets was not the owner of that credit card. We also discovered that those two airline tickets were never used. The passengers were a no-show. Since then we have not been able to find the client that called to purchase the tickets, his phone number century park hotel bangkok does not work and the address he gave if not valid here in our city.
Those of us who work in this industry love it, but it is a struggle to stay in business in these tough times. The airlines give nothing back to the travel agencies even though century park hotel bangkok we support them by selling their product. century park hotel bangkok Do you have any ideas on how I can get US Airways to understand our situation and change their minds regarding this debit memo?
Thank you for your patience while I had my team look into this. Although there isn't specific verbiage on our website, century park hotel bangkok regarding the alleged fraudulent booking activity for this specific situation, century park hotel bangkok our website does refer travel agents to ARC and ARC guidelines.
As an ARC accredited agency, travel agents agree to all of the booking practices and procedures as stipulated by ARC. In the ARC handbook, it lists ways to prevent fraudulent activity. Additionally, it notes, for credit card sales, specific steps that must be followed or the carrier can invoice the sale back to the travel agent.
From the email below, it would appear that not all of those guidelines, as determined by ARC, may have been followed. (Obtaining credit card info over the phone and getting an approval code does not validate that purchase as the card could be stolen or being used without the cardholder's authorization.)
I understand the frustration of your situation; you do offer the airline a lot of business and work very hard. While I'm not able to offer you any different resolution than you've found previously, hopefully the more detailed explanation that our rules are based on ARC will help you.
At least US Airways offered Swope a personal response. But I still don t understand how she might have verified the credit card information, beyond what she did. It s an expensive lesson for her to learn.
If a merchant sells a $1000 TV to a customer who pays with a credit card, and the card turns out to be fake or invalid, the merchant risks not only losing the $1000 (+ $35 charge back from the card processing company), but also the wholesale costs for the TV as well.
Chris, I definitely sympathize with the travel agent. However, travel agents have been on the hook for these types of fraudulent charges for quite some time. There are various steps that could have been taken by the travel agent to prevent this from happening as well. But being from Ohio myself, we are a trustworthy bunch. We trust what people say and take them at their word, so I can understand why the travel agent trusted the customer and did not take the proper verification steps.
She most likely will be sent to a collection agency and if she doesn t pay the debit memo, US Airways will likely turn off her ability to issue their tickets. No great loss as US Airways doesn t pay travel agents a cent to issue their tickets. She probably charges a small service charge of maybe $15 or $20 and is just getting by. Imagine how many tickets she must issue to pay for this debit memo?
I could write a book about how many times and in so many different ways the consumer (or supplier) has duped my company. The latest instance really wins the ultimate prize for cunning duplicity. I must say though, 99.99% of customers are actually fair and honest. It is only 0.01% that create chaos and in turn the higher century park hotel bangkok prices and surly service we all face when we travel.
Chris There are services that a business can use for phone charges to verify the validity of the card. The system we use has the ability to verify billing address century park hotel bangkok and the security code. All are key security features built into the card but not required for charging. If they don t match, it will alert you (our credit card processor also charges us less when we use them).
Having said that Your article doesn t make it clear on who charged the card? US Air or the TA? If it was US Air and they don t have the fraud protections in place, they share some of the responsibilty too. It shouldn t be completely on the TA.
As an ARC accredited agency, I have agreed to obtain an imprint of the credit card, have the client sign the imprint, verify their signature, and then verify the CVV and mailing address through our SABRE ticketing system.
Chris I guess the other question I have is who should have to pay for the fraud? The TA who interacted with the client and sold a risky booking or the airline who sold a ticket through a trusted source.
George, while I agree this is part of the reality century park hotel bangkok of being a merchant. the difference is that in this case the ticket wasn t actually used. In your example that would be the equivalent of the person not getting century park hotel bangkok the TV, since these customers didn t actually fly the flight.
As for if they flew the flight, then I would look at it a little differently, though I also don t understand century park hotel bangkok what the travel agent could have done differently. I think US Airways could have done better then that given the whole circumstances.
I sympathize with the OP, but her position isn t nearly century park hotel bangkok as clear as Chris paints it. Credit card companies have well established guidelines for determining whether a merchant is liable for a fraudulent credit card purchase. One of these rules is that a physical credit card must be swiped. If you don t swipte the card, the you run the risk of a chargeback if the owner disputes making the charge.
United has a position as well though. century park hotel bangkok It sold two seats. That means there are two less seats in inventory for sale. If United had to turn down someone else who wanted to buy the seats because of this transaction, then United would indeed be out $1500 dollars
I can sympathize with the travel agency. If I know my client who is calling I will take a credit card over the phone, otherwise the client must come in and show the credit card used, and identification that he/she is in fact the owner of the cc. It is not worth the headache and financial responsibility not to do this.
While I feel sorry for a business in my local area being duped, it would be very easy to have that person come down to the agency to sign the card and swipe it at the terminal. Check ID and do everything else that the credit card company requires you to do in order to protect yourself.
Also, if I were these agents, I would be asking US Air for a flight manifest in order to see if there were actually two empty seats on this plane because of her no-shows, or if the plane had been oversold and it was still a full flight. If the flight was full then I would think that the agency shouldn t have to pay a dime. If there were plenty of empty seats, then unfortunately I think the agency is on the hook fo the charges.
While I agree on the last part of your statement, century park hotel bangkok it is not entirely true. If the plane was full, and there were no shows, the airline has a right to sell the tickets to someone else. Then, should the individuals arrive, they would just be booked on a later flight.
It s nice to know that in Ohio, a stranger who calls with no verifiable phone number or verifiable century park hotel bangkok address can become a client just like that! While I sympathize with the agent, this is a reminder that we must be more cautious when dealing with people over the phone, especially when we have no preexisting relationship with them.
This should serve as a lesson to trust but verify. This might mean a lost commission or two, but that pales when compared to a $1528 debit. The next time a transaction smells fishy (e.g., last minute emergencies), tell the caller to contact the airline directly and let the airline assume the risk.
@ Mike Also, if I were these agents, I would be asking US Air for a flight manifest in order to see if there were actually two empty seats on this plane because of her no-shows, or if the plane had been oversold and it was still a full flight. If the flight was full then I would think that the agency shouldn't have to pay a dime. If there were plenty of empty seats, then unfortunately I think the agency is on the hook fo the charges.
Also people who do this know travel agencies run these thru the computer and normally do not verify the address against the card. A quick call to the credit card company to verify name and address would stop this
For an unknown customer, not referred by an existing client, on a rush order .I would have verified the fare first in Sabre then booked the flights as requested via usairways.com letting US accept ALL the responsibility
IF it was a good card, I would get my service fee via my merchant arrangement; if it was a bad card, I would only lose the chargeback on said service fee and let US, and any other airline so enamored of their web booking capabilities as a way to push out the TAs, to live with the consequences of their short-sightedness.
century park hotel bangkok I m having a hard time understanding what benefit the person using the credit card is getting out of this. They didn t get the money, did they? Does someone have a vendetta against century park hotel bangkok this particular tra