Oct 15, 2008 11:17 AM
2951 Views
All Indians/NRI's/Foreigners. Fraud Alert!
I , an NRI based in Melbourne Australia, booked a flight for 2 of my business colleagues through India's no 1 travel portal called Yatra.com
on 5th Oct 2008 to travel from New York to bBangalore and back . I authorised the payment of 1997 USD for 2 tickets through a strange system that is called "letter of verification" on which one needs to sign and send along with copies of the back and front of the credit card. This is as per yatra's website making it doubly sure that there is no chance of fraud.
Next thing when I check my Credit card activity statement on my banks netbanking system I find that my credit card has been debited for a sum of 2400 USD. I write to Yatra customer service and first they say they have no such transaction showing and the very next day informed me that indeed they have deducted a sum of 2400 USD in "ERROR" and that the money is being reversed to my credit card.
Then the best thing is that the amount has been deducted for an Emirates airlines flight as seen on the description of the credit card statement and not against Jet Airways which is the airline booked by me.
I emailed the customer support and they said that the refund has been initiated and that I will get it "soon". Soon has now become 11 days but no sign of refund. 3 people are involved what takes one simple command to reverse an erroneous transaction.
To make matters worse , they have gone and made another deduction against the jet airways flight and deducted another 1997 USD.
Yatra tries to make the customer feel very safe by doing what no one in this modern world does i.e asking for a "separate letter of verification" to keep us "safe from fraud". Then no refund is done.
Deducting money that has not been authorised by the client is tantamount to fraud. The one who talks about it , is the one who has committed fraud.
As a businessman you are totally in a fix as we depend on the card to move around and most of the places need a credit card like hotels/car rentals etc.
It is now 11 days and they are not giving me a proper date for the refund and not replying my mails.
Does any one in India have any advise as to what I must to do to bring these people to book. All your advise is solicited.
Thanks and regards
Lt Cdr (retd) CV Prakash
