Promised refund from Frontier Airlines went AWOL

DEAR TRAVEL TROUBLESHOOTER >> Frontier Airlines canceled my flights from Minneapolis to Denver last summer. I requested a refund since the next available flights were significantly later. Consequently, these Frontier flight cancellations qualify passengers for a refund under Department of Transportation regulations.

I have spent hours on hold with Frontier and talking to agents. When Frontier canceled my flights, a phone agent said they were able to find all of the payments I made by credit card and that every single one would be refunded to my Visa.

I don’t want or need any Frontier vouchers or flight credits. Several phone agents have assured me that they submitted a refund request, and I should wait seven to 10 business days for the refund to process. But I’ve been waiting for more than a year. Can you help me get my money back?

— Kristy Heer, Minnetonka, Minn.

ANSWER >> You’re right. Under Department of Transportation regulations, an airline owes you a refund if it cancels your flight. If you requested a refund, you should have received one within a week.

But it looks like there were a few complicating factors. You paid for your ticket with Frontier flight credits, which means you would have only been entitled to receive flight credits as a refund. However, it looks like a Frontier representative promised you a cash refund, even though you had paid with credits and paid only the taxes by credit card.

As a result, you received about $18 back from Frontier instead of the $253 you thought you would get. Making matters worse, it looks as if Frontier didn’t even try to reissue your flight credit, so you ended up with $18 and no flight credits. That doesn’t seem fair. After all, you didn’t cancel the flight — Frontier did.

I reviewed the paper trail between you and Frontier. Nice job on keeping all of your correspondence, by the way. It shows you repeatedly asking for something you were entitled to — a full refund. It also shows Frontier promising you that refund in writing. Why didn’t Frontier do what it said? I’m going to chalk this one up to pandemic confusion.

As a last resort, you could have reached out to one of the executive contacts at Frontier for help. I list the names, numbers and email addresses of the top customer service executives at Frontier on my consumer advocacy site at elliott.org/company-contacts/frontier-airlines. You can also file a complaint with the DOT at www.transportation.gov/airconsumer/file-consumer-complaint, which could have moved things along.

I reached out to Frontier on your behalf, and it issued the cash refund it had promised. A representative said your refund was already “in the queue” when I contacted it. You showed much more patience than Frontier deserved, but that patience was finally rewarded.