Consumer Claims Tribunal decision

I received the following letter from Joseph and Rita Xerri:

Our case against Vjaggi Montebello has been positively concluded for more than a month. I wrote to you last month, but to no avail. We are very disappointed now because we would be seen in a very bad light, to say the least.

We cannot understand why you don't feature us when you make such a big fuss to inform you of these cases. If you lost our letter, the case was of a tour to London in August 2005 which never took place because of a terrorism alert. Eventually the tribunal awarded us Lm100 which we received last August. We would like to see it featured next Sunday. You used to feature our complaint immediately; why not a positive note? No space maybe?

What positive note? In this case, the Xerris booked a flight to London and paid Vjaggi Montebello accordingly. Eventually the booked flight was cancelled following the terrorist bombing of July that year. Quite rightly Mr and Mrs Xerri asked Vjaggi Montebello for a refund. However Vjaggi Montebello refused to compensate Mr and Mrs Xerri.

Subsequently the Xerris submitted a claim for Lm208 to the Consumer Claims Tribunal (CCT) and on May 30, 2006, the arbiter decided in their favour. However, Vjaggi Montebello refused to honour the decision and adopted a unco-operative stance.

Eventually Mr and Mrs Xerri referred their case to the Customer Service Column. Believe it or not, despite the arbiter's decision in their favour, it took us one year and three months to eventually persuade Vjaggi Montebello to compensate the Xerris who, after all, were entitled to compensation.

I find it rather strange that Mr and Mrs Xerri are so keen to publicly thank Vjaggi Montebello - as can be seen from the fact that they wrote that their case had been positively concluded for more than a month. I ask them: Why did you have to refer your case to the CCT? When you obtained the arbiter's decision which entitled you to Lm100 plus expenses, why did you have to write to me to chase Vjaggi Montebello and wait for one year and three months for Vjaggi Montebello to eventually honour the decision?

Finally, I must reply to the Xerris' comment "we cannot understand why you don't feature us when you make such a big fuss to inform you of these cases."

Yes, as they aptly put it, I persistently "make such a big fuss" because the information I need is very important. Indeed I often have to keep asking consumers to inform me whether the traders involved have honoured the CCT decision or not. The reason why I "make such a big fuss" is because we have too many consumers who refer such cases to this column, yet when the supplier or trader involved honours the arbiter's decision they cannot be bothered to inform us.

Regular readers of this column know that we often feature lists of CCT decisions which are not honoured. Our recent list used to fill a whole page and I used to feature it every month. However, yet again, we had pending cases on our records which were resolved, but the consumers involved simply didn't inform us. Obviously such resolved cases must be removed from our list. However, if I am not informed that the cases are resolved, they will not be deleted from the list.

Consequently, in such cases I have the traders concerned on my back complaining. In all fairness I don't blame them. On the other hand I object to consumers who pester us about featuring their cases, and when the trader involved honours the arbiter's decision regarding their case, but the consumers involved don't inform us accordingly so that we can remove the suppliers/traders from the list. As a result we had to cancel our original list and are slowly compiling a new one.

I regret to inform Mr and Mrs Xerri that it goes against my grain to publicly thank Vjaggi Montebello for having taken one year and three months to honour the arbiter's decision. If they want to thank Vjaggi Montebello, they can do so themselves.

While we are on the subject of CCT decisions I feature below our current list of CCT decisions not honoured.

If you have referred a case to the Consumer Claims Tribunal, and the arbiter decided in your favour, but the trader refuses to honour the decision, send me a copy of the decision and we will add your case to this list.