Refunds bypass trade

P&O Cruises has admitted many passengers have been refunded thousands of pounds more than they actually paid.

Refund cheques for the cancelled 103-day cruise – which affected 1,752 passengers – have been sent out, but without including any discounts offered by agents.

The total overpayment is uncertain, but cruise discounts are typically around 10% with consumers rarely paying full price. In some cases clients have been overpaid by more than £3,000.

David Dingle, managing director of parent firm Carnival UK, said there was ‘every possibility’ passengers had been overpaid, but said P&O did not send the refunds via agents because it wanted to speed up the process and avoid extra administration. Customers received cheques last Saturday or Monday, he said.

"If agents rebated some commission to passengers we would not know about it. The position we took was to preserve the goodwill of the customer, which is good for P&O Cruises and good for travel agents as well.”

"Travel agents haven’t lost a penny,” he added.

Dingle said he did not know how much customers had initially paid and it would have delayed refunds to find out.

They had been repaid the full fare minus any discounts direct from P&O Cruises, he said.

The Aurora world cruise was scrapped last week following propulsion problems that had dogged the ship since its original departure date on January 9. It was due to call at 34 ports across 23 countries, but failed to go further than 25 miles off the Devon coast before returning to Southampton.