Loyalty program fraud is a major issue for airlines, and can come in many forms. For the most part, airlines are good at detecting suspicious behavior, and a vast majority of the time, when they accuse someone of something, they’re correct. That brings us to an interesting complaint that has been filed against Virgin Atlantic.
In this post:
Flying Club member files DOT complaint against Virgin Atlantic
The Department of Transportation (DOT) publishes all kinds of filings, which I routinely keep track of. In most cases, these are filings by airlines, which give us a sense of the routes they’re looking to launch, what new seats they may be looking to get certified, etc. However, in some cases these filings also include consumer complaints.
That brings us to a noteworthy complaint that was filed by a New Yorker named Chaim Zeev Rozen, against Virgin Atlantic. According to the complaint, Virgin Atlantic accused him of “loyalty fraud,” when he did nothing more than transfer points from his Chase Ultimate Rewards account to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, to book travel for his family. Then the airline didn’t even notify him that his tickets had been canceled, leaving them stranded.
Here are the details contained in the complaint:
- On December 3, 2023, Rozen opened a Virgin Atlantic Flying Club account, and on October 26, 2024, he transfered points from his Chase Ultimate Rewards account; specifically, he transfered 65,000 points, and thanks to a transfer bonus, that got him 91,000 points
- On October 26, 2024, he made a booking with points through the Virgin Atlantic website for his parents and his brother (who share the same last name) to travel on October 28, 2024, on Delta from New York to Milan
- When the family attempted to check-in, Delta informed them that Virgin Atlantic had canceled their tickets
- He was forced to purchase last minute tickets at a higher price, which required transferring an additional 69,000 points, and paying an additional $96.90; on top of that, the family couldn’t order special meals (since there wasn’t 24 hours notice), which were needed to accommodate dietary restrictions based on their religion
- He could no longer log into his Virgin Atlantic Flying Club account, and Virgin Atlantic never contacted him about the tickets being canceled, or about his account being locked
- He attempted to reach out to Virgin Atlantic, but they refused to provide any details about what he did wrong, other than accusing him of misconduct, and claiming their decision was final
- In an email on October 29, 2024, Virgin Atlantic simply stated that “your account has been suspended following recent investigations by our fraud protection team,” and that “we believe that your account has been used for fraudulent activity and has therefore breached our Flying Club Terms and Conditions”
Rozen points out all the way that the airline could have tried to verify if there was actually fraud:
“Despite Virgin’s protestations, there are obvious methods for Virgin Atlantic to investigate. If they thought I was selling points, they could have asked me, and I would have told them no. If they didn’t believe my simple attestation, they could have asked me to submit a sworn or notarized statement. They could ask me to explain my relationship with the passengers, or to prove it, and I could easily have done so. (My birth certificate shows that I, the account-holder, am the offspring of two of the passengers. And my brother’s birth certificate shows that he is also their offspring.) They could examine our booking patterns, which would have shown that none of us has ever redeemed points for any third party unknown to us, nor have we ever offered points for use by any third party unknown to us. Nothing in Virgin Atlantic’s communications with me indicates that they did any investigation like this, nor that they investigated in any other appropriate way. They seem to have seen the inbound transfer (from Chase) and redemption (on Delta) and immediately assumed the worst.
As Rozen summarizes the situation:
“The totality of the situation is Kafkaesque – an incorrect penalty meted out arbitrarily by a secret adversary that claims to be its own judge, jury, and executioner, with no apparent concern for either fairness or the DOT regulations that rightly disallow these tactics”
I’m curious how Virgin Atlantic responds to this complaint
As I mentioned earlier, airlines do deal with a ton of loyalty program fraud, and in my experience, they’re right a lot more often than they’re wrong. There’s a massive industry of points brokers, who essentially buy and sell points (or tickets booked with points), in order to make a profit.
Based on the details that Rozen provided, I can see how an itinerary like this might be flagged in general — you had a member who never had any activity, then transfered points for imminent travel for people other than the member. The reason these last minute bookings are suspicious is because that’s how a lot of fraud happens, where people will steal points in order to book last minute travel, before it’s caught.
But then actually looking at the details should’ve made it clear that this wasn’t fraud. Rozen was booking tickets for family members who have the same last name he does. Virtually all ticket fraud would be for people with different last names.
So I’m curious what’s going on here. Is Rozen telling the entire truth, or is he leaving out any important details? And if he is telling the truth, what the heck is wrong with Virgin Atlantic’s fraud department, that they think this is fraudulent activity, even after being confronted by the member?
My best guess on the situation (and this is purely speculation) is that since this was so last minute, the fraud department temporarily suspended these tickets to investigate. But given the imminent travel, tickets weren’t reinstated in time, and to avoid being held liable, the fraud department just doubled down.
Airline loyalty program contracts of carriage are really one-sided, which is to say that airlines basically reserve the right to cancel someone’s account or take their points away for any reason. That being said, canceling a confirmed ticket with no justifiable reason surely violates some basic good faith contract rules.
Since this complaint was filed with the DOT, Virgin Atlantic will have the chance to respond, and I look forward learning what the airline has to say. We’ll learn if the company was acting completely unreasonably, or if there’s more to the story.
Bottom line
A person has filed a complaint with the US Department of Transportation over an award ticket dispute. He transfered points from Chase Ultimate Rewards to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, to book last minute travel on Delta for his family.
The company’s fraud department accused him of misconduct, without providing more details on why. He ended up needing to book new tickets. Even after the fact, the airline doubled down, without actually providing any evidence for how he violated the rules.
Based on the facts presented, Virgin Atlantic was acting completely out of line. That being said, the beauty of these DOT filings is that we get to see both sides, so I’m curious how Virgin Atlantic responds.
What do you make of this complaint against Virgin Atlantic?
We don’t want a last minute booking either but we have to since some airlines release more seats at the last minute.
I booked a last minute ticket recently for my cousin and the agent mentioned they would need to verify my card and put a note in my file. I did so on connection through Seattle. The agent mentioned they do this for some bookings. Wonder if this would have prevented any of the issues.
"Chaim Zeem Rozen"
Enough said really.
I gotta say, it is an awesome name.
"Chaim Zeev Rozen" & Lawsuit? lol! lol! Find a Friendly Judge ( easily available) sue the country & airline, Judge easily passes judgment in Plaintiff's favor and now All the countries Deposits are confiscated by the Treasury Dept.
So ICE and DOGE are handling the VS fraud department now?
This is a crazy situation and wildly egregious. Not sure why anyone would question it given the fact he filed a complaint and is willing to attest and show the necessary documentation. To be clear, not only do we get vastly reduced availability and no notice redemption increases but now have to endure random targeting by fraud departments who want to cancel our tickets...
So ICE and DOGE are handling the VS fraud department now?
This is a crazy situation and wildly egregious. Not sure why anyone would question it given the fact he filed a complaint and is willing to attest and show the necessary documentation. To be clear, not only do we get vastly reduced availability and no notice redemption increases but now have to endure random targeting by fraud departments who want to cancel our tickets with no notification?
Please, bring back Pete to the DOT.
Anti-fraud teams of airlines have became extreme, doing whatever they want. My Aeroplan account was suspended half a year ago, but the only thing I used it to do was to search *A award ticket (by hand, not using any automated tool). There's no activity at all since I registered in 2022. Upon calling the customer service I was told to send my passport and proof of address to a mailbox, which I did so six months ago, but nothing happened yet.
you know what is so nice is a quiet comments section
I had the same thing happen to me. I signed up for a VS account years ago, but never used it. This year, I transferred points from Amex US and booked a partner award for my father (same last name) departing from country A (same country as in my VS account), while I was traveling in country B and then paid for the taxes using my US Amex card. The ticket was issued, but, by...
I had the same thing happen to me. I signed up for a VS account years ago, but never used it. This year, I transferred points from Amex US and booked a partner award for my father (same last name) departing from country A (same country as in my VS account), while I was traveling in country B and then paid for the taxes using my US Amex card. The ticket was issued, but, by coincidence, I saw the next day that the taxes had been refunded to my credit card. It turned out that the ticket had been canceled. There was no email from them or anything. I could no longer log into my VS account either. I called VS and they confirmed the booking had been flagged as fraudulent and they promised that someone would be getting back to me, but they never did. It was only when I emailed their executive team that someone replied to me. In the end, it turned out that it was the combination of booking for someone else (from the same country as in my VS account), with an IP address from another country and then paying for the ticket with a card from a third country (three different countries involved) that triggered the fraud alert. In the end, they asked me to submit a passport copy and utility bill to prove my identity and only then they reactivated my account and refunded the points. The whole process took a week. At this point, the award space was gone. VS even reached out to the airline partner and asked them to make award space available again, but they refused. When I complained that there had been no notification about the canceled ticket and that it was pure luck that I even saw that the ticket had been canceled, VS explained to me that it was “best practice not to inform the account holder,” as they suspected that my email account had been hacked as well (they send out a 2FA code to your email when you log in, so there is at least some logic to this claim). I still think this is a terrible policy. My father could have gone to the airport without a ticket…
The only good thing I have to say about VS is that their executive office couldn’t have been nicer about this. They even called me personally a couple of times. But if I hadn’t reached out to them, I doubt I would have been able to get the points back. They also told me they had left a note in my account, so that new bookings should no longer be flagged.
For anyone else going through this, this is the email address I had to send the passport copy and utility bill to in order to get this resolved:
loyalty.security.queries AT fly.virgin.com
There are lots of reports online about people who permanently lost access to their VS accounts and who never got their points back.
Maybe a trigger happy VS agent, and on later review they’ll back track & apologize.
Maybe a points fraudster who put one over on Ben.
Not yet enough info to make a conclusion but it looks like Chaim Rozen may be a fraudster.
He seems to be a fraudster because of?
Ok, so I'm ethnically Jewish. And not one of those "as a Jew" Jews that bash Israel - no, I happen to stand with Israel. So, to summarize, secular American Zionist Jew here. With that out of the way, the orthodox community is known to pool / share frequent flyer miles and book tickets for family members, friends, and other close-knit religious community members. So while in this case the usage may have been legitimate,...
Ok, so I'm ethnically Jewish. And not one of those "as a Jew" Jews that bash Israel - no, I happen to stand with Israel. So, to summarize, secular American Zionist Jew here. With that out of the way, the orthodox community is known to pool / share frequent flyer miles and book tickets for family members, friends, and other close-knit religious community members. So while in this case the usage may have been legitimate, this person may have been profiled based on their name and fraud suspected (due to other people with similar backgrounds actually committing legit fraud). Not saying what Virgin did was right, but leaving the context out makes it quite mysterious as far as what happened.
That’s pretty hypocritical - you’re talking about profiling, yet you're justifying account suspensions based purely on assumptions and someone’s background. That’s exactly how injustice starts.
This exact story has also happened to me. I transferred MR for a last minute booking from Amsterdam to Dubai under my own name. Upon booking, I received a dialogue which stated that I needed to show my credit card at check-in. Within 24 hours, I could not locate the PNR anymore and they refunded the taxes to my credit card. Received no e-mail whatsoever about my tickets being cancelled so called Virgin and was...
This exact story has also happened to me. I transferred MR for a last minute booking from Amsterdam to Dubai under my own name. Upon booking, I received a dialogue which stated that I needed to show my credit card at check-in. Within 24 hours, I could not locate the PNR anymore and they refunded the taxes to my credit card. Received no e-mail whatsoever about my tickets being cancelled so called Virgin and was told to e-mail "[email protected]" due to suspected fraud. Responses from them were generic and in broken English, stating that due to their "enhance review" they would not be reinstating my account. 0 investigation conducted whatsoever.
Full email correspondence here: https://i.imgur.com/b7v92Gm.png
Since it was also for a relatively small amount of points I did not have the energy to chase further.
Oh, and in the end, I was able to book the same flights with a departure two days later, and it indeed wasn’t canceled and my father successfully flew it.
Woops, this should have gone under my own comment obviously…
From that email, it sounds like Virgin's fraud department is full of fresh off the boat illiterates! I wonder where they find such idiots to work there.
@Ben, so what happens next? How long does Virgin have to respond and is the airline's response always posted publicly?
These stories are compelling. VS seems to have triggerhappy personnel. My guess is, like Canadian Banks, their Fraud Department is immune to outside criticism, so gets away with anything they want. If they know they can abuse you without consequences they will abuse you.
I have flown Virgin Atlantic multiple times and I find the staff's conduct to be let's say 'VIRGIN'.
Their staff is not well trained at all. They do dumb things. Nothing nasty but just stupid things.
Dumb things like sticking the luggage receipts at checking to my passport. Making my passport really sticky. Then on the return right the check in agent commenting on how sticky my passport is!
The flight attendants also do dumb things. Bad training.
What a stupid comment. I’ve had agents from multiple different airlines place those stickers on my passport. It’s not a Virgin issue, although I agree it’s frustrating.
That luggage receipt on passport/ID issue is very common across airlines. The solutions is (shockingly!) to just tell the agent not to do it. Easy.
Happened to a colleague whom I was helping. Opened a VS account, transferred points from his own Amex to his own VS account, booked a flight for his daughter (same last name, same address). Showed up to check-in at LHR, was interrogated and ticket voided. We ended up booking a new ticket on AA and got into a legal battle with VS. They ended up settling with a reinstatement of the points and a free...
Happened to a colleague whom I was helping. Opened a VS account, transferred points from his own Amex to his own VS account, booked a flight for his daughter (same last name, same address). Showed up to check-in at LHR, was interrogated and ticket voided. We ended up booking a new ticket on AA and got into a legal battle with VS. They ended up settling with a reinstatement of the points and a free J roundtrip, but it was a huge fight, they were incredibly unreasonable, and my colleague still ended up eating the cost of the new (very expensive) flight on AA. Someone should class action the crap out of them.
Had same thing happened to me. I had booked flights 3 months out for my in-laws (we don’t share last names) from my account. In our case, we never got email about ticket cancelled but I found out when I saw the refund of taxes and fees on my credit card. VS asked me to send ID for my account, IDs for my in-laws and proof of relationship. I send our marriage certificate and my...
Had same thing happened to me. I had booked flights 3 months out for my in-laws (we don’t share last names) from my account. In our case, we never got email about ticket cancelled but I found out when I saw the refund of taxes and fees on my credit card. VS asked me to send ID for my account, IDs for my in-laws and proof of relationship. I send our marriage certificate and my wife’s birth certificate to prove the were my in-laws and the account was restored and points reinstated. They emailed me and asked to book the flights again and promised they wont cancel it. Only for them to cancel the new booking too!!! This time, I emailed them and forwarded the last email where I had provided all info. This time, the reinstated the account without needing to go through all the hoops and again promised to not cancel the new bookings. I made a new reservation and it worked and my in laws flew that itinerary. Very frustrating experience but at least we had time to resolve it.
Sorry Ben, after reading this article TWICE I still have no idea what "loyalty fraud" is.
@ Dempseyzdad -- Hah, sorry if it wasn't clear. Loyalty fraud can come in many different forms, but presumably here the concern was that he was a points broker, selling points to other people at a profit.
I was in a somewhat similar situation with Chase Bank where they implicitly accused me of fraud, and would not answer direct questions about the case, and rather just stuck to this, "we investigated and it's final" type attitude. It really drives one mad.
You simply cannot accept what they say. They told me there was no avenue for appeal. Well, I rejected that notion and eventually won. But I would get heated and...
I was in a somewhat similar situation with Chase Bank where they implicitly accused me of fraud, and would not answer direct questions about the case, and rather just stuck to this, "we investigated and it's final" type attitude. It really drives one mad.
You simply cannot accept what they say. They told me there was no avenue for appeal. Well, I rejected that notion and eventually won. But I would get heated and fired up every time I thought about it - a fundamental lack of decency/sense/explanation.
The same thing happened to me. I transferred points and made a redemption for my uncle. Vs cancelled the flights and closed my account. I’d never redeemed for anyone else before. Upon emailing them I got the same generic email. It was only 33k points so decided not to chase but wtf
Maybe there's a totally separate issue not disclosed, like a bogus status match?
@ Nitpicker -- There absolutely could be something else, which is why I'm curious to see how Virgin Atlantic responds. I can't imagine Virgin Atlantic's fraud department is otherwise this unreasonable.
I've heard of this happen to many people.
Virgin Atlantic is beyond unreasonable.
I see other people commenting here, too.
Thank you to Mr. Rozen for taking the time to file the complaints for all of us (not me personally).
It may not be people being unreaosnable - it's their "AI" code which is the problem.
And when it makes a mistake, the human managers do not want to admit it.
How soon until DansDeals launches a class action discrimination lawsuit against Virgin and Delta?
Careful, no religion has been referred to. Some people are over sensitive to things like these.
I have heard tons of such stories with virgin accounts, nothing else behind them. as mentioned they are completely in the wrong and should have a class action against them. I understand why a flag may be raised but there should be recourse to prove innocence.
I've heard of this happen to many people.
Virgin Atlantic is beyond unreasonable.
I see other people commenting here, too.
Thank you to Mr. Rozen for taking the time to file the complaints for all of us (not me personally).
If you're jealous, you can always convert.
No one mentioned anything about discrimination here.
You and Eskimo are dirt bags with a helping of scum.
Alter ego Homer the Dunn?