Apple Leisure Group Vacations (ALGV) is improving its systems to process refunds and travel credits faster, Jacki Marks, executive vice president-trade brands, told travel agents in a memo.

“As acknowledged in the past, we’ve been good about enhancing the VAX booking engine, making you, our advisors, more productive and profitable using the tools and functions our platform has to offer,” Marks wrote. “The trade-off, however, was that we were less focused on the back office needs that would have been beneficial for something like a pandemic. We appreciate your helping us navigate through that and sticking with us as we work to correct this.”

She said air credits and refunds required a manual process to check each reservation, speak to the airline, confirm, then process a refund, or add it to the customer's travel credit. A new functionality that was launched Oct. 21 lets the company identify all reservations for which they’ve already received refunds from the booking’s airline.

“You may ask, ‘What does this mean for me?’ Well, that we can much more quickly give your customers these funds back or add it to their travel credit, for one,” Marks wrote. “As I speak, we are actively working on getting these amounts loaded or refunded. And in addition, we’re in final testing phases for a new way for you to check your clients’ travel credit balance amount, so stay tuned for that as well!”

Marks also said that ALGV is now refunding all normal reservations within 30 days. “Be sure to check the comments on your reservations to see the date your refund was submitted and when it was completed,” she said. “If you do not see a comment that your refund was submitted, you need to submit a refund request in VAX through the Fund Request link in your reservation.”

ALGV has also launched new technology that lets agents use the original reservation number to make a payment on a new reservation. Agents must request a credit on the original booking by hitting Fund Request in the reservation in VAX. Then, after receiving a confirmation email that the funds are ready to use, agents can use the original reservation number to apply the funds to the new booking.

Marks also encouraged agents to run a reservations report for their bookings in VAX to review the status and to check the comments to ensure requests are complete.

Marks also expressed gratitude to travel advisors. “I want to thank you for your patience throughout this. We know this has not been easy, but I hope you'll take heart — as I do — in the fact that we are learning and adapting together.”

For more information on refunds and rebookings, click here.