An hour ago I booked a flight with gotogate.ch to which I was led by skyscanners.ch. They bilked me out of chf 146 and I'd just like to warn others not to be as foolish as me.
After going through the usual pages of details and options, unticking all those boxes, I was presented with a page showing the exact amout I was to pay and invited to enter my card details.
After my payment was accepted, the next screen came up with a much larger amount, I'd been charged an additional chf 97.72 for using a Mastercard and 39.00 for "Reiserücktrittsversicherung" which I'm certain I'd gone back to untick. At no time before payment was I warned of this extra charge, and I imagine that I probably wasn't allowed to untick Reiserücktrittsversicherung, but no warning of this either. This goes way beyond the little tricks that Easyjet and Ryanair used to play on their sites - it's plain cheating.
Is there a trade organisation in Switzerland to whom I could complain about gotogate? The site is a Swiss one and the payment was in Swiss Francs. I don't think these people should be allowed to trade.
Going back to skyscanners it does warn that some agents charge extra for credit cards, but not that the large amout will be witheld from you until after you've paid.
The lesson? use a proper travel agent, not someone on the internet you've never heard of.
After going through the usual pages of details and options, unticking all those boxes, I was presented with a page showing the exact amout I was to pay and invited to enter my card details.
After my payment was accepted, the next screen came up with a much larger amount, I'd been charged an additional chf 97.72 for using a Mastercard and 39.00 for "Reiserücktrittsversicherung" which I'm certain I'd gone back to untick. At no time before payment was I warned of this extra charge, and I imagine that I probably wasn't allowed to untick Reiserücktrittsversicherung, but no warning of this either. This goes way beyond the little tricks that Easyjet and Ryanair used to play on their sites - it's plain cheating.
Is there a trade organisation in Switzerland to whom I could complain about gotogate? The site is a Swiss one and the payment was in Swiss Francs. I don't think these people should be allowed to trade.
Going back to skyscanners it does warn that some agents charge extra for credit cards, but not that the large amout will be witheld from you until after you've paid.
The lesson? use a proper travel agent, not someone on the internet you've never heard of.