Expat stranded in the UK is waiting for nearly €1,000 worth of cancelled air fare refunds

A BRITISH expat who was visiting her children and grandchildren in the UK when lockdown hit is still stranded there and waiting for nearly €1,000 worth of refunds from Ryanair and Jet2.

Judith Don has booked three different flights with Ryanair and two with Jet2 since March 12 in a bid to get back to her husband in La Manga, but all of the flights have been cancelled. Even a Jet2 flight scheduled for departure on July 1 when the air network is supposed to be back up and running has been cancelled.

Ryanair said refunds would be made within 28 days, but Judith’s husband Philip, speaking to the Euro Weekly News from the couple’s Murcia home, said they had not been refunded a penny to date.

Philip, who is in his 60s and has been on his own in La Manga throughout Spain’s strict coronavirus lockdown, said: “I have sent repeated emails to Ryanair. On March 21 I received an email acknowledging mine and saying there would be a refund within 28 days. I am still waiting. I have received an email from Jet2 to say that I would receive my refund from them in the next week, so I will wait and see if that happens.

“It is difficult, because we fly from Alicante into East Midlands, so we don’t have much choice of who to fly with. It is Ryanair or Jet2. We had no other choice but to keep trying to book flights to get Judith home,” he said.

Judith, who was helping with her grandchildren during her visit to family in Loughborough, is now booked on a Ryanair flight from East Midlands back to Alicante airport on July 3.

Earlier in the month, Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary said that it could take up to three months for passengers to be paid the money they are owed. He said the airline was dealing with a backlog of 35 million refund requests.

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Written by

Helen Barklam

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