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EasyJet review: fraud and scam 15

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Author of the review
5:16 am EDT
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I am a regular Easyjet user, having booked some 30+ flights in the last 12 months. In general I am impressed with the service and price, particularly their reliable time keeping. Clearly not having to wait for connecting flights like the main carriers and not being able to afford any down-time has its benefits.

But...

A recent incident caused me to question whether or not Easyjet has some dubious schemes to bolster their tight margins. Having booked on-line and printed off the confirmation for a particular flight I turned up at the airport as usual where I was told that I did not have a booking. Armed with my booking confirmation, after several phone calls I was told that my ticket had been withdrawn by Easyjet. [Note that the withdrawal of the ticket was not notified to me in anyway].

As my trip was important, and the airport staff said that I would have to put in a written claim, I was forced to buy a new ticket over the counter. Clearly an on the day ticket cost me considerably more than my original one.

Subsequently, after many expensive minutes talking to various call-center staff, I was informed that the credit card used in the original transaction had been black-listed and the ticket withdrawn as a suspected fraudulent purchase. I was told to contact my bank.

The issuing bank and Visa confirmed that the card is valid and has never been flagged as lost, stolen or used in any fraudulent transaction and that transactions on the card continue to be honored. Apparently Easyjet's internal fraud control had unilaterally placed the card on their black-list and of course for security reasons they are unable to divulge the information that lead them to this decision.

They have been unable to tell me why they have accepted the payment from a card that was supposedly black-listed. As original the transaction had been executed and the money transferred to Easyjet I now have a claim against Easyjet for the original ticket purchase, the difference in price for the ticket I was forced to buy on the day, the call-center charges and the interest lost on my money.

Moreover, I have been told that the card can not be taken off their black-list, so if I want to purchase on line, I need to get my bank to reissue a card with a new number - a further expense. My claim is being considered by Easyjet, however with 20 day communication turn-around times it is likely to be many months before I see my money - assuming Easyjet agree to repay, which is by no means certain at this time.

I have subsequently heard the exact same story from someone else, so I was wondering if could this be a systematic process to force people to buy more expensive tickets and earn interest from the monies held from the initial purchase - surely not! What is extremely frustrating is that because this related to a supposed fraudulent transaction I am treated with suspicion when I try to get information about my claim. This is ironic as there clearly is a fraudulent transaction, a fraud perpetrated by Easyjet! They have effectively refused to deliver a product or service for which payment has been accepted.

In addition to following the painful process through the call-center and web site, I have written to Andrew Harisson on this matter - needless to say he has not reply. I have also notified Easyjet under the data protection act that they are holding erroneous personal data on their systems that should be rectified.

15 comments
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Taylor Gillespie
Jul 20, 2008 6:04 pm EDT

I will never fly with this airline again.
I tried to book our Christmas vacation as every year but now they put in extra charges for your baggage, sports, taxes, and many more.
This is just not what this airline was all about to start with offering low cost, easy on-line bookings with no frills.
I am afraid the days of easyjet are now numbered and we will be booking with other companies in the future.
They should be renamed as NOT VERY EASY JET AS WE ADD ON LOTS OF EXTRA MONEY TO YOUR BOOKING.COM.
This company was sold out at the right time by Stelios as it cannot supply what its name suggests -EASY.
Try booking and you will see what I mean!

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Michael Mullery, MD, MBA
Jul 26, 2008 11:23 pm EDT

I had exactly the same experience as the above poster Phillip Waterman. I original booked in Feb 2008 for a flight in May 2008. My AMEX credit card paid EasyJet the 63 Euro cost of my one way fare and EasyJet issued me a confirmed flight confirmation. The charge appeared on my credit card statement the next month. When I arrived for my flight, I was informed for the very first time by EasyJet's agent that my ticket had been canceled because "my bank was refusing to pay them because of a "FRAUD "on my account. (THIS WAS AN ABSOLUTE LIE). My bank never withheld payment for any reason, let alone fraud! It turns out that bogus Fraud alert was something that EasyJet created on its own several days after my credit card company had actually paid them!. With the benefit of Wifi at the airport, I was able to access on line my AMEX statement and prove to EasyJet that they had already received payment from AMEX, but they could not have cared less. EasyJet still insisted that I pay them an additional 255 Euro to fly from AMS -LUT. SInce I had to catch an unrefundable transatlantic flight out of Luton, I had no choice but to pay their extortionist sum.

While at the airport, I was approached by an individual who claimed to have previously worked for the revenue department at EasyJet and he informed me that this is one of EasyJet's schemes. Foreigners are the best targets for this scheme as they have very little recourse by which to fight this action.

I believe that EasyJet poses a white collar criminal threat to Americans who travel abroad, and I am in the process of reporting them to the US State Department.

Like this fellow traveler, I flew previously with EasyJet without incident, most recently in the Fall of 2007, so there really is no way of predicting when you may be targeted.

If you are an American and are booking on EasyJet, I suggest the following.
1. Take note of the fact that a charge which goes through to your credit card does not mean that you have a valid reservation with them, nor does the possession of a confirmed booking number. If EasyJet arbitrarily and capriciously decides to not honor your ticket, you will not know so by a charge back on your credit card statement, as they do not refund the money when they deny you carriage for so called "fraud."
2. Don't assume that just because you did not get an email from them, that they have not canceled your reservation for so called called "fraud." They will not send you an email!
3. Sign in regularly to your account on line (like anyone would think to do that) and look to see if your reservation has been flagged for fraud. In my case the flagging was not immediate, but occurred two days after AMEX' had already make payment to them.

If you ask me, this is quite a scheme by a group of corporate criminals! If I don't get my full 255 Euros back, I am seriously considering returning to England and filing criminal charges against the individuals involved in this extortionist crime, including the CEO of EasyJet, who as the previous poster indicated is clearly aware of these fraudulent tactics.

I agree with the above poster Phillip Waterman that FRAUD is definitely occuring here, and I agree with him that perpetrator of this FRAUD is EasyJet.

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peteandemma
CY
Jun 29, 2009 8:58 am EDT

Well ours is a slightly different story, as someone DID Fraudulently use our card, my husband noticed rang our bank and they r sending as a form 2 claim the money back - what pissed me of was someone was going 2 get a free flight so I told my husband to ring and cancel the flights huuummmm (10p per min)
1st they would not tell us anything as it was not in our name !
Our online statement is open and the £200 has been paid to them by us LOL
I wanted it cancelled so we kept on at her, she then atmitted that it had already been highlighted as a fraudulent booking, SO WHY DONT THEY CONACT THE BANKS? who could then contact the card holder.
So were r our rights ? The law breaker is protected but not us this just doesn't seem right.
They are awaer of a FRAUD so surely it is there responsability to report it. This would also help inocent like thouse above turning up to find their legit flights caceled.

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Andyk_leics
Coalville, GB
Aug 22, 2009 6:28 pm EDT

As it happends, I was called by easyjet today, about a flight I have booked in September. I too got the line from them that my booking has been cancelled due to my card being flagged as suspected fraudulent activity. I have checked with my bank and they are unaware of any such activity and they told me my card is still valid. When I asked easyjet to accept payment from a different card, they told me they were unable to honor the original price I paid two months ago. Now they want me to pay over 120 GBP more! I will tell you that this to me proves that Easyjet are the fraudsters! They are scamming their passengers who have alreay made bookings by cancelling their booking and making them pay more when the price has changed. I am putting a case together to report them to the authorities. I would recommend that anybody thinks twice about booking a flight with this airline. You may think you have paid for it and got a confirmation but they have proved that you could turn up at the airport and they will tell you your card is invalid when it is not, just to get you to pay more! Book with Easyjet at your PERIL!..

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HappySunshine
GB
Jan 25, 2010 9:15 am EST

EASY JET - NOT SO EASY!

Same thing happened to me, for the second time running in one year! Both times I showed up to the airport and found out that my seat was cancelled and so called money refunded to me (it has not) - cancelled due to fraudulant card - what rubbish. I not only spent money getting to the airport and back (once to Stansted, once to Luton), its emotionally tiring as there is no face-to-face interaction but a piece of paper shoved into your face asking you to call a ludicrusly expensive number and no e-mail. Ofcourse no one replies. The first time I bought a brand new ticket at the desk, the second time I turned away with so much anger and frustration and vowed never to be flying that flight again, even if I get a free ride!

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S. Alexander
London, GB
Apr 01, 2010 4:54 pm EDT

Easyjet have a bad reputation. There's no doubt about that. It's interesting to hear how they have scammed American consumers for using their services while travelling abroad. As a British citizen I have experienced problems with them in the UK. Here's what happened to me.

I booked a trip to visit relatives, selecting the dates carefully and confirming the booking. The booking came back as incorrect by one day - so I had no option to go through their web pages to amend the day of my departure. This ended up costing me extra. As this was no fault of my own I tried to get hold of them by telephone.

Unfortunately it is now Easter so I will not have any luck speaking to a customer service representative until the weekend is over. Undeterred, I attempted to get hold of them by email.

Their webpage in the UK states that ' your browser must have javascript enabled to contact us via email'. Still with javascript enabled and using three web browsers I was unable to obtain an email address for easjet. I had to resort to googling the company and obtained an email address in order to put forward my complaint.

I have no doubt that they will not deal with my complain in any satisfactory way - that is if they respond to it.

The last straw was when I attempted to book transport to the airport. One of the reasons I made the booking at this specific airport was because the transport costs were reasonable. I went through the booking proceedures for this and got directed to a new webpage - easybus - a subsidary of easyjet.

While processing the request for a coach service the server stopped responding. Meanwhile a disclaimer below states 'only press the payment button once and wait while the server processes your request'. Suddenly it all became clear. Easyjet want you to pay for your flights twice, easy jet wants you to pay for your cheap coach twice.

I also have no doubt there is a corporate strategy involved in facilitating these poor proceedures - ultimately designed to take consumers money in a fraudulent way.

Anyone who thinks the way forward to beating corporate robbery like this would be sitting in front of your computer with a video camera, documenting the way in which this company robs the individual so that this evidence can be used in court to bring the company to justice is probably on to a solution. However, an 'easy' (tm) solution is to communicate their poor practice with the marvels of global communication (such as we are using).

Anyone for a web page/forum entitled 'Reasons not to fly with Easy jet - consumer advice on your planned journey'?

Thanks for reading.

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ben l f
FR
May 01, 2011 8:20 am EDT
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

same thing happened to me. turned up at the airport to be told that my ticket had been cancelled and my money refunded. at this point no money has left my account and hopfully it wont. i was told that it was because my card was used to buy tickets fraudulantly over 6 months ago and that they would have blocked my card if i had tried to make a reservation until it was resolved. this made me start to get suspicious as i had flown with them in november 2 months after this apparent fraud. they are now telling me that until this is resolved i will not be able to make a reservation with easyjet regardless of which card i use as my name will be blocked by the system. the only possibility is "to get there as early as possible and buy a ticket at the desk".
i have obviously spoken to my bank who have told me there are no problems with the card and nothing has been flagged.

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malcolmf
nuneaton, GB
May 01, 2011 1:02 pm EDT

agree with all above - they are the most appalling company to deal with ! My son's card was refused because of apparent fraudulent misuse 6 moths prior. He turned up at the airport to be told his booking was cancelled because of the attempted scam. He re-booked using my debit card which was initially accepted but then refused and now my bookings have also been blocked until bank statements have been sent. Yes you can turn up to the desk and pay the ticket price on the day - as I said earlier - APPALLING.

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Anony007
GB
Aug 27, 2012 12:19 pm EDT

This is a horrible flight. The flights from Glasgow to London especially are the worst. The customer service executive at the main check in terminal do not give any instructions saying that an addon purse for a lady is not allowed. During the boarding of the flight the lady miss L something (she did not allow me to take her name down) asked me to pay for an additional check in baggage. This lady has been behaving very rude and un appropriate. Horrible horrible service.

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Rose17
Portsmouth, GB
Dec 30, 2012 7:58 am EST
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

I have had exactly this problem, they cancelled four flights in total (after telling me to rebook each time with different card/email address). Finally I printed my boarding pass (for a single flight home from Spain) and turned up to the airport on the day to be told at the check-in desk abroad that the flight had been cancelled internally by EasyJet THAT DAY. They had not informed me, nor refunded the money to my bank, and it resulted in a large over the counter fare being bought so I could return home. After a few emails, EasyJet are now claiming my own bank card is fraudulent and demanding £400 in charges from me, whilst also black listing me from flying with them! It is ridiculous it is MY bank card and I booked the flight for ME! My bank has no records of any fraudulent activity. Has anyone had any luck with refunds?

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cmau
FR
Apr 11, 2013 3:35 pm EDT

I will never fly with Easyjet and I will be making sure nobody ever does! Our story is exactly the same as most above. A week ago I had purchased one way tickets over their website, received a confirmation email and today as I go to print my boarding pass...nothing the webpage says it has no record of me purchasing a flight when clearly I am looking at the confirmation email which says I have and the money has been debited from my account! Furthermore when I ring the customer service number to ask what has happened it's the same story, my credit card has been suspected of fraudulent activity and they could not give me more information than that. I have booked with Easyjet numerous times with the same card, I was horrified when they told me my card was blacklisted and straight away I rang my bank to verify if there had been any suspicious activity on my card and nope nothing my card is indeed valid! Worse was that I was not even informed once that my purchased had been cancelled, I had to find this out for myself but I am also glad I picked up on it early instead of showing up to the counter and be told this and made to pay more upfront but I think the worst part of all this was the no-contact from their part and to what conclusion they drew to say my card was suspicious when in fact confirmation from my bank say it is clearly not, I guess loyalty does not mean a damn thing to this company.

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John C Wallace
London, GB
Apr 29, 2013 10:23 am EDT
Verified customer This complaint was posted by a verified customer. Learn more

My wife and I boarded Esyjet in Nice last night. We were sat (by Easyjet) in row 19, which placed us next to an emengency exit, but with extra legroom. A man boarded who was in some pain (facially showing signs of distress) and his seat was in a row in front of ours, with usual, not extra leg room. He was suffering from some complex, and clearly distressing back complaint. I offered to take his seat, leaving him with my extra legroom, and my wife, who is able bodied was able to receove instruction on how to open the exit. The stewardess told me I could not offer him my seat, as she had understood it was because the man was in pain, and thus, in her words, 'be able yo open the exit'. This was after she knew my wife could! The man continued to sit in his cramped seat, but only 9 rows forward, in fact in row 1 there were three vacant seats, where the suffering person could have been seated. The stewardess refused to even consider this, and knew I felt this was absurd, so she asked me if I wanted to speak to the chief steward. It was her invitation to me. I went forward and spoke to the steward, as we stood next to the empty seats. I asked why they could help this man who was clearly in pain. The stewards repsponse was to the effect that if he was in pain, he might hinder the process of opening the exit. Since this was row 1, the exit was in fact the main door to the aircraft, and the seat free was in the aisle, so in both cases the stewards arguments were ridiculous. I told him so, and has started along the lines of whether I knew more about running airlines etc than him. He was totally obdurate, and clearly had no intention of aiding his passenger, but was wholly intent upon defeating me, and my requests. Not shouting, I told him I thought he was 'pathetic. He retorted that my attitude would get me removed from the flight. Not believing such a minor matter could ever give rise to such a thing, I suggested he ought to try! We waited another 5 minutes, and then I was invited forward to speak to the Captain, via a telephone. This failed to work, so the Captain came out to talk to me. He asked why I had abused his staff. I told him exactly why, anjd that I thought they were being ridiculous not to take any notice of a passenger in pain, and help them, which they could so easily do. The Captain asked whether I would obey instructions. This floored me, as I had never received any instruction. I told him as such. That it was their staff who had invited me to come up, first to speak to the steward, and then to the Captain. He repeated that if I was not prepared to follow instructions, he would not have me on his plane. It was ridiculous, and I can only surmise the Steward hald told lies about my actions, as if I was either inciting the por man in pain, or remonstrating with the staff, out of my seat. I did neither.
We waited another ten minutes, and they went back to the stand, and called the Police to escort me and my wiife off the plane.
I have no idea how I can get compensation for this? The French Police were gob-smacked as when they arrived they had been given my name, but expected to find some drunken yob, rather than a fairly well dressed couple in their 60's.
They thought it was crass and suggested they had other instances of over-reaction like this from Easyjet, who they suggested was a poorly run airline.
I could not agree more!

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Pippa Morley
Cote, GB
Sep 04, 2014 9:45 am EDT

After a wonderful holiday in Ibiza it ended with an appalling display from easyJet in Ibiza and their 'customer service' phone line. We arrived 2 hours before check in and were told that they had over booked the flight and we had to go to the customer service desk - incidentally, after talking to the girl behind the desk who told us the next available flight was on 1st September, it turns out it was a sales desk - she gave us the number for the 'customer service' line who were very infuriating, saying that we could have €250 euros each, this would not cover the loss of earnings and the parking at Gatwick. I am epileptic and told them this and that I didn't have enough medication to last until 1st September, apparently this does not matter. I then asked if we could be put on the next flight at 10pm, apparently that flight was fully booked so we couldn't be put on this flight... That is funny since we booked on the 9.40 flight and didn't have a seat! I spoke to the 'manager' of customer services about this and after him re telling me what everyone else had said, he then told me that there was nothing he could do regarding booking us on to a new flight and we had to see the sales desk. She suggested that we checked our bag in on the off chance someone didn't make the flight and fortunately for us they did. Though this did not help the lady who was in the same situation as us but with 3 young children. It was a bitter end to an otherwise amazing holiday, their customer services, both at the airport and over the phone, are a complete joke, I have never had such poor customer service in my life, not once did we receive an apology. I worked in the service industry for many years, surely they are aware that if someone has a good experience they tell a few people, if they have a bad experience they tell everyone, which is what we will be doing, and I will happily pay more money to fly with an alternative airline from now on.

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Reviewer36561
Sep 22, 2015 6:22 am EDT

Cancelling a flight that was booked wrongfully because of calendar suggestion cost me the entire fare. They gave me a voucer I could wipe my ### with. Will never even consider EJ for a future trip.

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Tetsu98
US
Jul 04, 2016 5:19 am EDT

I've never even heard of EasyJet until just a few days ago. I understand this thread has been dead for more quite some time now, with a comment posted last year. I have no idea how it happened, as it is still being investigated by the fraud department of my bank... in the mean time I'm out nearly $200 to this company and one called "eDream", which is supposedly the same company. I live in Eastern Canada. I was in class at work when these charges were made, and I have no idea how anyone got a hold of my information.

This is a warning to ANYONE who see's something from EasyJet on their statement.

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