Americans, how long until you received your refund?

[cellfree]

BermudaBound20, thank you for sharing your process. The two refunds I am waiting for were both one charge each (booked when needed to be paid in full) but as I said I was concerned that I am not disuputing the entire amount. Might give Chase a call regardless.

Edited July 13, 2020 by cellfree

[dexddd]

23 hours ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

 

Just curious (as it's none of my business), but is there a reason you aren't filing a dispute with your CC yet? If I recall correctly, we are in similar time frames with canceled/requests.  I'm 99% confident that the only reason I received my funds back at 90 days is that I filed a dispute. Once I did that, MSC got the ball rolling (but still waited to post my refund to the next billing cycle which gave them an extra 30 days). 

 

I'm about to cancel my January cruise on HAL and request a deposit back. HAL seems just about as slow as MSC :(. 

 

Best of luck to everyone still waiting!! 

At 60 days I gave them benefit to go to 90.  Once that came and went I was seeing mixed feedback here and on NCL boards that Amex started to not be as quick to return funds so at that point at three more weeks figured I'd wait.

 

At that point, my patience will be over.  I have written documentation of everything that can easily be passed to Amex.  I might even do a full request back since they've breached everything promised.  That three weeks is here soon.

 

This has been handled VERY poorly on their part.  Even cheapo NCL has been better from what I'm seeing over there.

[cellfree]

You wait and wait and wait some more and then you think ‘well I’ve waited this long I don’t know if I want to start all over again.’ I am not sure what I will do. What I do not like hearing about now, although  I am happy for them,  is refunds being processed in a week or two. I am convinced MARCH was the worst time to request a refund and that there are batches of refund requests “sitting in a big black hole” somewhere. 

To review my summary:

March 14 requested FCC for two March 29 cruises

April 24 received the two FCCs in an email

Called MSC several times - am always told it says “processed April 20”

Today July 14 - still no taxes/fees returned to credit card (and yes cc is active)

[alyssamma]

I want to add another few data points. I had a bunch of cruises and some excursions with MSC. I filed a dispute with my CC company a while back - 7 in total. Two were resolved fairly quickly so I had hopes for the others. But today 3 were resolved in MSC's favor. When I called in to my CC company I was told MSC said the charges were valid. These were for August cruises out of Denmark...which obviously doesn't exist anymore.

 

I was a little pissed the CC company (Citi) didn't ask me for supporting documentation, but whatever. They said today I had to send proof of cancellation. Luckily I kept receipts for this because there is no way on the "new" MSC website to see canceled cruises.

 

I believe MSC made this change on purpose to make it harder to prove cancellation.

 

Furthermore, we called into MSC to ask the ***** and were given the same story others here have given - our TA did the request "wrong". Luckily we had him on the line also and the conversation between him and MSC was like something out of the Twilight zone. There was a "new" procedure he was supposed to follow, but no one told him that and the *old* procedure still worked.

 

I would strongly encourage everyone to start the dispute process on their CC and forget the waiting game. 

[BermudaBound2014]

25 minutes ago, alyssamma said:

 But today 3 were resolved in MSC's favor. When I called in to my CC company I was told MSC said the charges were valid. These were for August cruises out of Denmark...which obviously doesn't exist anymore. 

 

I'm not sure I am understanding, how can the charges be valid if the cruise is cancelled?

[alyssamma]

13 minutes ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

 

I'm not sure I am understanding, how can the charges be valid if the cruise is cancelled?

That is my point...they aren't valid but MSC claimed they were. Honestly, if I hadn't dealt with MSC before I would believe it to be a scam on their part. But since I have, I believe it to be pure incompetence. This is why some refunds are processed and others aren't. It depends on who is manually doing what and if they check all of the right boxes.

 

So now I have to prove to my CC company that I canceled a cruise that doesn't exist anymore. Luckily I have that proof, but my point is you *used* to be able to see that online. MSC has removed that ability so it makes it impossible if you didn't save your receipts.

[BermudaBound2014]

2 minutes ago, alyssamma said:

 Honestly, if I hadn't dealt with MSC before I would believe it to be a scam on their part. But since I have, I believe it to be pure incompetence.

 

This about sums it up. All cruise lines are dealing with refunds, but MSC makes things worse with inconsistent 'stories'. Example; .... "You didn't file for full refund, you filed for FCC" or "we lost your filing"  or   "your TA did paperwork wrong" or ....... "it will be 60 days from sailing not 60 days from filing dispute"..... or .... "We only process on Monday"..... I could go on and on.

 

I love MSC and want them to survive, but consistent customer service has never been their strong point, especially when dealing with shore-side. This is evidenced by multiple USA travel agents refusing to sell the product because MSC is just too hard to deal with. 

 

Let us know how the time frame works out. I suspect you may be getting a refund 60 or 90 days from the time your cruise was set to sail in August. 

[dexddd]

Today is day 116.  The only activity I see is the cruise is no longer a ghost ship listing in "All My Cruises" section so maybe finally in process but have heard nothing and nothing back to card.

[cellfree]

Dexdd, same boat (ha, I wish) nothing on cc yet. To be fair to MSC, and we thoroughly enjoy cruising MSC, there are others just as guilty/outrageous. I had to call and email UAL multiple times before refund properly applied. And IRS has had my return since March, and after working my way through the system and figuring out what to press to get a real live person, I have been told my return is most likely in a mail box that was being held for several months due to COVID19, and I should see my refund sometime in July. 

[APDMOM]

2 hours ago, dexddd said:

Today is day 116.  The only activity I see is the cruise is no longer a ghost ship listing in "All My Cruises" section so maybe finally in process but have heard nothing and nothing back to card.

 

Glad to hear there is some progress.  I had one of those ghost ships too.  Made a call today, and it is now gone.  Very good customer service from Vincent and he said I should see the deposit refunded in 7-10 days.  We shall see. 🙂 Only $98 this time, so not as pressing.

 

 I really think something went wrong at the beginning with March refunds.  We used to have a TA until they closed shop without telling us.  After that bad experience a couple of years ago, we decided to give up the TA benefits, and I am glad in this instance.  I really think it has helped us with MSC.  

[dexddd]

At the end of the day, they've breached what they told me three times.

 

We took some risk to book our first trip on MSC in 2017 for extended family graduation.  It was great.  At the CC party Captain Massa talked about how MSC expanding into US and how the line was a family and wanted all of us to be part of it.

 

Two more and all was great.  Put trust in FCC and have been indirectly told we are part of the family - the part of the family that is not cared about.  A simple public apology to all would go a long way. 

 

They can can come up with blue ribbon group to get cruising again.  How about putting a person to oversight excessively delayed refunds?

[aprilF]

Dear OP, the answer to your question for us is "never".  MSC never refunded our money, after allowing 60 days from the cancellation of our trip we disputed the charges on our Costco Visa and the charge was just made permanent, 61 days after the dispute was filed.  So, 121 days later we have our money thanks to Visa.  MSC never refunded anything.

 

For those looking at datapoints:

We booked this cruise on board while on another cruise.  The original cruise was booked through Expedia so I guess they technically had the booking but something got forked up.  For all purposes (even before the COVID issues) it was as if we booked direct with MSC, Expedia couldnt really help us with too much and we could never access the cruise in Expedia's system via my account.  So there was so super strangeness happening there and I am uncertain if that was because of MSC or Expedia.  I tried several times to fix through Expedia eventually giving up since MSC could see my reservation and it seemed I could do everything I needed to do direct through MSC.  If I were one of few having difficulties, I might chalk the refund delay up to this issue.  I'm very tempted to believe based on these experiences that MSC is the one that was causing my issues as I usually use Expedia and have never had issues with them before.

 

I am 3 days away from being 60 days from my sail date.  Which is not when MSC said they were going to refund me but it's data.

 

Other than the initial cancellation via phone and then a follow up cancellation via the website (since the first cancellation didnt seem to take) I have not contacted MSC about a refund.  It seemed pointless given the run around people were getting.

 

Timeline- phone cancellation 3/17, told 30 days for refund less deposit. 

3/30 filled out form on line since cruise was cancelled, emailed 60 days for refund

5/16 filed dispute with Visa for both deposit and remainder of cruise balance

7/16 temp credits on Visa became permanent

 

 

Speculation: to me it looks like MSC is currently refunding deposits only cruises quickly.  Likely in hopes to keep that business in the future.  But they are keeping cruises that are paid in full as long as possible, allowing disputes to go unanswered so they get the full extra 60 days in order to continue their interest free loans they think they are due.  My advice is that if you have paid anything more than the deposit, dispute it now.  Might as well get that final clock going.

 

Side question, not that I think this will happen but what if our Costco Visa still has a negative balance at the end of the rewards cycle...do we pay Costco?

 

 

 

 

[phissy]

1 hour ago, aprilF said:

 

 

 

Side question, not that I think this will happen but what if our Costco Visa still has a negative balance at the end of the rewards cycle...do we pay Costco?

REPLY:

1 hour ago, aprilF said:

 

You have a credit balance on your Costco Visa.  If you have auto pay set up, no payment is made. If you pay manually, no payment is needed.   We currently have large credit balance on our Visa from cancelled international airfares.  Will be a couple of months before we have a balance due.

 

 

 

Edited July 16, 2020 by phissy

[phissy]

Just submitted our dispute with Visa yesterday for our cruise.

 

We have no confidence MSC will come through with refund any time soon.  Submitted request for refund on April 29.

Chase Reserve Visa has us submit copies of charges and emails regarding this cruise.  They said they need our documentation and signature to process our request.  Perhaps because it is about $10,000?

 

We now feel more confident that refund will be coming.....one way or another.

 

Edited July 16, 2020 by phissy

[electro]

4 hours ago, phissy said:

Just submitted our dispute with Visa yesterday for our cruise.

 

We have no confidence MSC will come through with refund any time soon.  Submitted request for refund on April 29.

Chase Reserve Visa has us submit copies of charges and emails regarding this cruise.  They said they need our documentation and signature to process our request.  Perhaps because it is about $10,000?

 

We now feel more confident that refund will be coming.....one way or another.

 

Just wondering if you expect to sail MSC again?

 

I agreed to FCC and return of taxes. Did the paperwork on Mar 29 for 2 cruises in May.

I was suppose to get the FCC within 60 days, it is now over 110 days and no FCCs and no refund of taxes/port fees.

I am thinking of doing a dispute with our cc but would still like to sail MSC in the future.

I don't know if doing a cc dispute will put me on a no sail list.

 

Lois

 

[phissy]

9 minutes ago, electro said:

Just wondering if you expect to sail MSC again?

 

I agreed to FCC and return of taxes. Did the paperwork on Mar 29 for 2 cruises in May.

I was suppose to get the FCC within 60 days, it is now over 110 days and no FCCs and no refund of taxes/port fees.

I am thinking of doing a dispute with our cc but would still like to sail MSC in the future.

I don't know if doing a cc dispute will put me on a no sail list.

 

Lois

 

We have 4 cruises booked for late next year.  

  After discussing options with TA, decided for refund of all fees. These were the concerns...

If you get FCC and apply it to a cruise, you cannot change it later.   also, many reporting you had to wait for FCC to book new cruise. We booked all 4 end of March, before cruise fares increased to accommodate the 125% FCC issued to passengers.

The fares for those cruises have increased $2,000 for 14 day YC since we booked.  If we decided to cancel some of those cruises, our deposits can be applied to the one we keep.  We want to have flexibility to see what hurricane season will look like next year.

A credit card dispute will not put you on a no sail list with MSC.

 

[sfaaa]

FCC also disqualifies you to take advantage of some MSC promo. The explanation given was this promo is capacity controlled and you don't qualify because you use FCC. Seriously?

[aprilF]

7 hours ago, phissy said:

REPLY:

 

This is not what I am asking.  Costco gives a cash refund on 3% of your spending for the year.  I have a little over $10K in refunds on my Costco card.  We arent shopping a ton since we are staying at home and have no big purchases planned (and I never want to hope for something unplanned to pop up).  What happens if our spend for the year does not exceed the refunds we have received for the year?  Ive already received the cash back for most of that 10K because it was paid last year.

 

Anyone ever been in this odd position?  I dont care enough to call--hate phones--I can just be surprised if no one knows.

[BermudaBound2014]

26 minutes ago, sfaaa said:

FCC also disqualifies you to take advantage of some MSC promo. The explanation given was this promo is capacity controlled and you don't qualify because you use FCC. Seriously?

 

And several members of this very forum thought I was crazy for predicting this outcome back in March. On a side note: MSC is not the only one putting restrictions on the use of FCC's. Not sticking up for MSC, just stating the facts that all FCC's are likely to be highly regulated, making them much less valuable thatn 125% (imo of course) :).

 

 

 

2 hours ago, electro said:

I am thinking of doing a dispute with our cc but would still like to sail MSC in the future.

I don't know if doing a cc dispute will put me on a no sail list.

 

IMO: You will not be placed on a 'do not board' list from MSC. Each and every cruise company is going to be begging for customers for the next few years. I wouldn't give this another thought. Dispute your CC, take cash (not FCC) and then book once things settle down and we know which companies are going to survive the inevitable the cruise line mergers and bankruptcy filings  (IMO of course :)). 

[phissy]

1 hour ago, aprilF said:

This is not what I am asking.  Costco gives a cash refund on 3% of your spending for the year.  I have a little over $10K in refunds on my Costco card.  We arent shopping a ton since we are staying at home and have no big purchases planned (and I never want to hope for something unplanned to pop up).  What happens if our spend for the year does not exceed the refunds we have received for the year?  Ive already received the cash back for most of that 10K because it was paid last year.

 

Anyone ever been in this odd position?  I dont care enough to call--hate phones--I can just be surprised if no one knows.

OK, I think I get what you are asking.    

Just re-read your original post.

 

If you are asking if Costco will want the 3% travel rebate back if cruise is refunded, answer is probably yes. Not sure how you will be notified, but Citi may be the ones who reverse the dollar amount you received as rebate on travel.

 

Costco Citi Visa card has rebates depending on spend. Executive members get additional on spend.

  .Citi Costco Visa offers  4 % for gas, 3% for travel/restaurants,2% Costco purchases ( plus2% executive member), 1% for everything else. 

Annual Rebate Certificate can be redeemed for cash or merchandise in Costco warehouses.

Sounds like your Rebate Certificate was credited to your Costco Citi Visa Account?...or you were issued a Costco Cash Card.

I have received Costco Cash Card as part of Cruise rebate after completing cruise in the past.

If you have rebate certificate or Costco Cash Card, you can go to warehouse and get cash.

We live in Issaquah, and Costco corporate warehouse is where we shop. Sometimes the amount of cash is large and they have to go across the way to get the cash from corporate. I come back 30 minutes later and pick up at membership desk.

 I have cashed out these certificates. I have never heard of one being issued for $10,000.

If it is indeed a credit on Visa card, simply request that Citi  send you a check for that balance and deposit that in your checking account.

If Citi comes back with charge for reverse of travel rebate, you will have money in your checking account.

  

Normally, most credit cards will be glad to issue check for credit amount.  We just did this on Capitol One card.

Hope this helps.

Edited July 17, 2020 by phissy

[phissy]

2 hours ago, sfaaa said:

FCC also disqualifies you to take advantage of some MSC promo. The explanation given was this promo is capacity controlled and you don't qualify because you use FCC. Seriously?

Another good point.

[aprilF]

On 7/16/2020 at 9:03 PM, phissy said:

OK, I think I get what you are asking.    

Just re-read your original post.

 

If you are asking if Costco will want the 3% travel rebate back if cruise is refunded, answer is probably yes. Not sure how you will be notified, but Citi may be the ones who reverse the dollar amount you received as rebate on travel.

 

Costco Citi Visa card has rebates depending on spend. Executive members get additional on spend.

  .Citi Costco Visa offers  4 % for gas, 3% for travel/restaurants,2% Costco purchases ( plus2% executive member), 1% for everything else. 

Annual Rebate Certificate can be redeemed for cash or merchandise in Costco warehouses.

Sounds like your Rebate Certificate was credited to your Costco Citi Visa Account?...or you were issued a Costco Cash Card.

I have received Costco Cash Card as part of Cruise rebate after completing cruise in the past.

If you have rebate certificate or Costco Cash Card, you can go to warehouse and get cash.

We live in Issaquah, and Costco corporate warehouse is where we shop. Sometimes the amount of cash is large and they have to go across the way to get the cash from corporate. I come back 30 minutes later and pick up at membership desk.

 I have cashed out these certificates. I have never heard of one being issued for $10,000.

If it is indeed a credit on Visa card, simply request that Citi  send you a check for that balance and deposit that in your checking account.

If Citi comes back with charge for reverse of travel rebate, you will have money in your checking account.

  

Normally, most credit cards will be glad to issue check for credit amount.  We just did this on Capitol One card.

Hope this helps.

You are still misunderstanding what I am asking, you are way over complicating things.  I cant think of a more simplistic way to ask other than to say I am asking what if my spend for the year is less than the refunds I have received.  What does that do to my end of the year refund?  I know I can request a check for the negative balance I have on my account but I cant imagine that is counted on spend and really has no bearing on the question I am asking.

[phissy]

3 hours ago, aprilF said:

You are still misunderstanding what I am asking, you are way over complicating things.  I cant think of a more simplistic way to ask other than to say I am asking what if my spend for the year is less than the refunds I have received.  What does that do to my end of the year refund?  I know I can request a check for the negative balance I have on my account but I cant imagine that is counted on spend and really has no bearing on the question I am asking.

Confusing refund vs rebate -  Costco Visa  offers Costco Cash (Rebate) on purchases.

Go to your Citi Costco Visa account online and click on Costco Cash rewards section.

It will give you your current balance. Rewards Certificates are issued at beginning of the year. If you do not have positive balance I would imagine no Rewards Certificate will be issued.

[aprilF]

17 hours ago, phissy said:

Confusing refund vs rebate -  Costco Visa  offers Costco Cash (Rebate) on purchases.

Go to your Citi Costco Visa account online and click on Costco Cash rewards section.

It will give you your current balance. Rewards Certificates are issued at beginning of the year. If you do not have positive balance I would imagine no Rewards Certificate will be issued.

I was asking if anyone has been in this position and what was expected.  I can, of course, speculate myself. 

 

I keep trying to find larger ticket items I can buy through Costco (or even just with the Costco Visa being the best "deal" to use) but other places with better rewards scenarios keep winning out.  So its looking highly likely I will find out myself what happens, if its $0 or if we actually owe Costco rewards (as strange as that would be it would be fair).  LOL

[cellfree]

Back to original subject line - March 14 requests for two March 29 cancelled cruises - still waiting for refund of taxes/fees which are to go back onto credit card.