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Hello. Long time lurker.
I feel let down by Wizz Air following a recent interaction with their customer support. I use them frequently due to their flight schedule and departure airport on a particular city pair being very convenient to me.
In the past, Wizz Air have quite generously offered customers the possibility of a free rebooking on the same route or reimbursement as flight credit in case of any schedule changes. I benefited from this multiple times in the past, and I was not aware, it seems, that this was recently changed without any notification.
I therefore contacted Wizz Air via their call centre when one of my bookings had a schedule change. I clearly mentioned that I am calling due to a schedule change to my flight, offered my PNR, and asked if I can cancel free of charge in exchange for flight credit. The agent stated this is fine and and proceeded to cancel my reservation, mentioning that my account will be credited by customer support in a few days.
As there was no credit to be seen in my account after a couple of months, I followed up via their online form. It took them forever to respond, but when they finally did, they said that the cancellation fee exceeds the cost of my flight and that no reimbursement is due as the schedule change was below their threshold (which they state is now a change of more than 5 hours rather than any change regardless of time difference as it used to be).
Following the call centre interaction, I went ahead and booked a different flight that worked better for me. It would have made no sense to cancel if I had been made aware of the change to their terms & conditions OR that a cancellation fee will apply.
They will not budge and advised I am free to submit a claim with the relevant legal authorities.
I assume this is not worth pursuing, but I am now out of pocket and frustrated by the whole experience. Am I in the wrong here?
It sounds as though Wizz was operating a goodwill policy which you were able to use for a while until they changed it. As that policy was operated on a goodwill basis and not a contractual basis, they probably aren’t required to notify you when it ceases to apply. However, any cancellation fees that applied to your ticket should have been notified at the time of purchase. The issue of when schedule changes entitle someone to free changes/full refund is a grey area and different airlines operate different policies. I don’t think it has been properly tested, but it is generally thought to apply along the delay times for EC261 rights. At this stage, months after the event, there is probably little point pursuing Wizz who seem not to care even about legal proceedings.
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