Cancelling a Delta SkyMiles redemption – especially in Basic Economy – is straight forward, but what you get back in your refund even Delta doesn’t know.
If you are considering booking travel or signing up for a new credit card please click here. Both support LiveAndLetsFly.com.
If you haven’t followed us on Facebook or Instagram, add us today.
Cancelling A Delta SkyMiles Award Ticket Is Easy
Delta Air Lines has a great app and they make it easy to cancel a ticket, including award bookings. Before a traveler processes their cancellation they are warned of any penalties. In the case of Basic Economy redemptions (which ours was) Delta informs travelers that they will pay a penalty in miles but doesn’t disclose what it is prior to the cancellation.
This is particularly problematic if you don’t need to cancel, but are trying to compare options. Delta stating that it will refund the taxes back to the payment method is legally required because the airline can’t retain taxes related to a flight it didn’t take.
Perhaps the mileage refund is all of the SkyMiles redeemed, perhaps it is none of them, and perhaps it is somewhere in between. It’s bad business for Delta to say “we are penalizing you [something]” but not disclose what the penalty is, but it appears not that Delta won’t say but rather that it doesn’t know.
Delta Can’t Figure Out The Refund Amount
Following the cancellation, surely in an email they will state how much I should expect back. It states when to expect the refund (3 days for the Skymiles, 7 days for the taxes paid). And, of course, Delta has to have a system and calculation for what it will return to flyers. In other communications there is a carve out for Basic Economy and a penalty, but after it’s cancelled, no such penalty is mentioned.
Yet another email arrived shortly thereafter with more of my details, but again, no refund of SkyMiles nor even a mention of what I initially paid.
How Is This Possible?
Delta refunds department should certainly know how much will be returned to my SkyMiles account. And while it states the carrier will be deducting the cancellation fee in the form of miles, I would personally prefer to view any fees and consider the costs to return all of the SkyMiles.
It seems like simply a bad practice. At this point, I am also expecting that I will receive something more than zero simply because it’s so complex to calculate.
Links in the email and through the process suggest checking ticket numbers to track the process but this produced nothing for me. I can also appreciate that higher end tickets will be refunded in full while Basic Economy won’t carry the same weight. Still something should be disclosed while considering cancelling your flight.
Conclusion
Delta should simply state the penalty (as a percentage or a flat fee) whether in cash or in SkyMiles what travelers will forfeit with a cancellation. I can’t imagine how the airline benefits from delaying this information and for travelers, this obscurity makes me less likely to book SkyMiles tickets in the future.
What do you think?
Airlines wish to know the reason for the cancellation , so they can consider whether a refund is warranted .
Reasonable .
Delta didn’t ask for a reason during their process. If they want a reason, just supply options in a drop down and we’re happy to select them. But it’s their designed process and there’s no other airline that I know of that makes it a mystery for seemingly both themselves and the customer.
Acceptable reason : arm amputated by a Lion .
Would love to know what the % penalty needed up being per ticket.
Me too, I still don’t have an update even to say “zero” skymiles back.
That’s utterly unacceptable. What if the “penalty” is 100% of the miles? How would you know until it’s too late?
Sadly I have to say I’m not surprised to see this from Delta. They have worked hard to remove any value at all from loyalty and the Sky Pesos program is this is just another step. Since a basic economy ticket purchased with cash isn’t refundable why should one purchased with miles be.
So what was the eventual % penalty?
9,900 domestic
19,900 long-haul
In my recent experience when refunding a miles ticket, I was refunded the full mileage as well as the taxes within 5 minutes of executing the cancellation. I’m platinum medallion, so perhaps that had some outsized effect on the process?
“Delta stating that it will refund the taxes back to the payment method is legally required because the airline can’t retain taxes related to a flight it didn’t take.”
I agree that this should be the case and so have always wondered how JetBlue gets away with not refunding your taxes back to your credit card when you cancel an award ticket with them. They instead refund award taxes to your travel bank, which then expire in 1 year. Crazy!
I’m pretty confident that if you asked for JetBlue to refund the taxes back to the payment method they would. Most don’t so they don’t have to comply, I guess.
So you wrote this with no idea of what the penalty is? I’m not saying the front end is transparent. But perhaps wait until the end result to give a synopsis?
Shouldn’t you know the penalty before you cancel?
Read up. I was asking what the penalty actually is. Shouldn’t you report on that once you know?
It should have been spelled out in the fare rules at the time of purchase. The fare rules are provided via a hyperlink in the fine print at the final checkout page before the purchase is made. Whenever you purchase a ticket, always print the fare rules to pdf and save the file using the reservation reference confirmation code.
Lol don’t book basic economy