Hotwire refuses refund for ‘no-show’ customer

A: If your flight was canceled, you deserved a full refund, no questions asked.

You say you were marked as a “no-show” on the outbound flight, but it’s difficult to say which airline had marked you as absent and at what point in the journey it happened. When a customer noshows, the entire fare is forfeited. That’s not just a Garuda or Qatar thing; it’s an industrywide policy. When you miss a flight, you lose it all.

It looks as if you spent way too much time on the phone with Hotwire. I note that you had a paper trail,

I have had a very tough time dealing with Hotwire to be reimbursed for a flight that was canceled due to bad weather.

I was scheduled to fly round trip from Denpasar, Bali, to New York earlier this year. The flight, operated by Garuda Indonesia and Qatar Airways, was purchased through Hotwire.

When I arrived at the airport in Denpasar, I was told that I would not be able to take the flight because of the blizzard in New York. I asked to take the first flight — I had a layover in Qatar — but was told that since the second leg of my trip was canceled, I could not take any part of the trip.

I attempted to call Hotwire to reschedule my flight. I finally got through and was told that the only option for the next three days was a $5,000 ticket through Paris. I declined and instead booked a one-way ticket to New York through Orbitz.

When I arrived in the U.S., I called Hotwire a dozen times over a two-month period. Each time I called, I spoke to someone different and was given different information about a refund, whom I needed to speak to and even which airline controlled the refund. I was told several times that I was marked as a “no-show” for the flight. I’m really lost as to what to do at this point. I would really like a full refund for this ticket.

— Rachel Abott, Baltimore which is good. I recommend relying on that documentation by escalating it to a supervisor at Hotwire — I publish the names and numbers of them on my consumer advocacy site (elliott.org/company -contacts/hotwire )—and letting that person worry about your missing refund. After all, Hotwire is your travel agency.

Your circumstances were special. You were working with two airlines, a weather-related cancellation that may not have been recognized by all parties as a weather cancellation and an online travel agency that seems ill-equipped to handle a complex itinerary and refund. Hotwire is great for simple, point-to-point domestic flights on which you want to save money, but the more complex the itinerary, the more you need to consider a human travel agent.

Hotwire agreed to refund the full $950. Christopher Elliott is the ombudsman for National Geographic Traveler magazine and the author of “How to Be the World’s Smartest Traveler.” You can read more travel tips on his blog, or email him at