Dubai’s Emirates processes 1.7 million refund requests; returns $1.7bn to customers

Dubai’s Emirates processes 1.7 million refund requests; returns $1.7bn to customers

Dubai-based carrier Emirates validated and processed a whopping 1.7 million refund requests it received over a seven-month period starting April this year.

The refund requests resulted in the airline returning Dhs6.3bn ($1.71bn) to its customers, of which Dhs4.7bn had been booked directly with the airline. The residual was returned via travel agencies.

The refund requests were filed primarily due to the travel disruption in the wake of the Covid-19 spread.

Emirates also managed over 130,000 refunds-related queries from customers and travel agency partners, and made status changes to nearly 4 million flight coupons.

At the peak of its project, Emirates had 110 personnel dedicated to validating and processing refunds, from a pre-pandemic workforce of 19.

"In the early months of 2020, Covid-19 massively disrupted travel around the world and led to an unprecedented volume of refunds requests across the aviation and travel industry, including at Emirates,“ said Sir Tim Clark, president of Emirates Airline. "It was not a situation any airline wanted, particularly while also facing a cash crunch from drastically reduced operations.

"Thanks to the efforts of our refunds and customer service teams, the support and co-operation of our partners, and the understanding of our customers, Emirates has now cleared our backlog of refunds.