Stuck with useless air tickets after concert cancellation? Sorry for you

03 March 2015 - 16:46 By On your case, with Wendy Knowler
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Show tickets. File photo.
Show tickets. File photo.
Image: Gallo Images/Thinkstock

Darryn Botha of Durban wrote: "My fiancee and I bought two tickets in December to go watch a music concert in Cape Town in March".

“We then went ahead and booked our flights to Cape Town. Last week I received an email saying that the concert has been moved to July, so we are now sitting with two return tickets to Cape Town for a concert that is not taking place at that time.

“Although the ticket company has offered to refund the tickets, they are refusing to cover any associated costs of cancelling or moving our flight dates. Are they not responsible for this expense, as they have not delivered on what they offered?”

Wendy Knowler's advice:

Sadly, there's nothing in the Consumer Protection Act which compels the ticket company to refund you for your air tickets, despite them being of no use to you now that the show has been postponed.

It’s a cautionary tale for those who book to see shows in other cities and then make flight bookings to get there.  If a show is cancelled, you’ll get the show ticket cost refunded, but not money you’ve spent on airfares. Most airlines allow you to change the date for a fee, but the tickets cannot be transferred into other people’s names.

Oh no, that's not what the consumer wanted to hear:

Botha responded: “Unfortunately, in our case, because flights are more expensive in July than in March, the cost of transferring our existing tickets to the new dates is almost as much as buying two new ones”.

You can contact Wendy Knowler with your consumer issues via email: consumer@knowler.co.za or on Twitter: @wendyknowler

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