Reimbursement of per diem from HAL after testing positive

[CafeBruno]

1 hour ago, Gray Lady said:

We never received an email telling us our claim was approved. They told me when I called that it was, but couldn’t tell me when we would receive it. We submitted our claim in September, but that was after we waited to received our AON reimbursement. I called HAL at least 7 times about it. Have you used the magic phrase that you may have to get your attorney involved? If I remember correctly, you contacted COVID in Fairbanks? We were there about the same time, only we were pre-cruise and you were post-cruise??

Yes, exactly right, we tested positive and spent our quarantine in Fairbanks, back in June. We submitted our claim on June 26. But you submitted your claim in September and have gotten reimbursed already? I am very happy for you, but I am puzzled that HAL's 3rd party payor is apparently not processing reimbursements in date order. Guess I need to be more vocal about it with HAL. 

[Gray Lady]

11 hours ago, CafeBruno said:

Yes, exactly right, we tested positive and spent our quarantine in Fairbanks, back in June. We submitted our claim on June 26. But you submitted your claim in September and have gotten reimbursed already? I am very happy for you, but I am puzzled that HAL's 3rd party payor is apparently not processing reimbursements in date order. Guess I need to be more vocal about it with HAL. 

Did you have other trip insurance at all? We needed to submit copies of their payouts before HAL would even take our claim. Waiting for that was a two month process first. We needed to be reimbursed for our excursions also. I kept calling about those, and they were finally refunded earlier this month. I am very happy to be reimbursed, but the process itself is very convoluted. Do you have a TA who could help you at all? Right now we are burned out on the thought of cruising with anyone, anywhere. No one should have to wait six months to receive all of their money for reimbursement. 

[CafeBruno]

41 minutes ago, Gray Lady said:

Did you have other trip insurance at all? We needed to submit copies of their payouts before HAL would even take our claim. Waiting for that was a two month process first. We needed to be reimbursed for our excursions also. I kept calling about those, and they were finally refunded earlier this month. I am very happy to be reimbursed, but the process itself is very convoluted. Do you have a TA who could help you at all? Right now we are burned out on the thought of cruising with anyone, anywhere. No one should have to wait six months to receive all of their money for reimbursement. 

No we didn't have insurance for that trip, and I included that fact when we submitted our paperwork to HAL. And the TA we booked with has been no help at all.

 

I guess the thing that bugs me the most is that HAL emailed us in early September that our claim was approved and to expect a check in the mail from their 3rd party payor. Why use a 3rd party if it takes them over 3 months and counting to issue the check after its approved by HAL? I get that HAL is overwhelmed, but I would expect the 3rd party payor to be able to process payments a lot quicker than that. I guess I'll follow your example and call HAL every few days, and start emailing the office of the president. Thanks 

[Gray Lady]

Yes, and keep track of time waiting on phone, who you speak with, and what they say. That makes it easier as you go up the chain of command. You should have your money  by now. The next question is if you would ever sail with HAL again because of this.

[CafeBruno]

3 hours ago, Gray Lady said:

Yes, and keep track of time waiting on phone, who you speak with, and what they say. That makes it easier as you go up the chain of command. You should have your money  by now. The next question is if you would ever sail with HAL again because of this.

Thanks @Gray Lady, good advice as usual, I will do that. 

 

And yes, call me a masochist, but I still really prefer the HAL onboard experience to other lines, and so I will be sailing with them again, for 7 days in January, and then for 35 days in February-March. Thanks again 

[flgus]

I had a false positive on a cruise in May 22.  It caused a one day delay to get retested ashore.  Travel Guard just paid in late December so I have submitted the reimbursement package for the remaining costs to HA by email.  It’s discouraging that I received no acknowledgment from HA, but doesn’t sound out of line with the other experiences here.

[f1jon]

Gray Lady I hope you finally got your $100/day per person meal reimbursement.  We got ours in the form of a check on June 5 for our 10 days of isolation. I did send another request to customer relations on May 23 and maybe that helped. All total, It took 10 months to get the check. 

 

Jon

[Gray Lady]

4 minutes ago, f1jon said:

Gray Lady I hope you finally got your $100/day per person meal reimbursement.  We got ours in the form of a check on June 5 for our 10 days of isolation. I did send another request to customer relations on May 23 and maybe that helped. All total, It took 10 months to get the check. 

 

Jon

There is no reason whatsoever that it should take that long for you to get reimbursement! Yes, we did get our per diem and hotel refund. I kept calling every other week because HAL still owed us refunds for our excursions and kept a log. I finally found one person who actually listened to me. I again used the phrase that I didn’t want to go to consumer affairs (under the umbrella of state attorney general) in WA and CA, but would if I needed to. I call it the Christmas miracle, because our money and refunds all arrived on December 23rd - 6 months after our quarantine. They refunded us all of our excursions and gave us all of our money for hotel and per diem. As to the question if we would ever sail with HAL again, we are booked on a future Mediterranean cruise with Regent Seven Seas. We definitely will buy cruise insurance, but things should be way better by the time we sail in 2024. 

[birdie16]

On 6/28/2022 at 10:34 AM, Gray Lady said:

Just wondering if anyone has done this and I am curious how it works. We finished our quarantine and were told we would get a $100 per person per diem for food while we quarantined. All our paper said was that HAL would reimburse us once we finished our isolation period. Do they do this automatically? Do you get it with your refund for your hotel room? Do you contact them directly? Just wanted to learn from someone else who had done it so we know what to expect and do. Thank you! 

They promised us per diem, but we never got it. They reimbursed us for the hotel and our Uber.

[Gray Lady]

29 minutes ago, birdie16 said:

They promised us per diem, but we never got it. They reimbursed us for the hotel and our Uber.

Did you turn in an expense form with Hal for the per diem? If not, I would call them, ask for one, and submit it along with your supporting paperwork from the hotel.

[birdie16]

9 minutes ago, Gray Lady said:

Did you turn in an expense form with Hal for the per diem? If not, I would call them, ask for one, and submit it along with your supporting paperwork from the hotel.

We did turn it in, along with receipts.They only reimbursed us for our actual meals, which were not much. We weren’t trying to make money on the situation, so I’m good.

[Gray Lady]

Just now, birdie16 said:

We did turn it in, along with receipts.They only reimbursed us for our actual meals, which were not much. We weren’t trying to make money on the situation, so I’m good.

We didn’t turn in any receipts for meals, just asked for the per diem. Maybe they were confused because of the submitted receipts? They seemed to be very overwhelmed with trying to even process all of claims.

[flgus]

I hope you have better luck than I have,  submitted claim multiple times, called twice.  Have never been contacted or paid in maybe a year now.  

[Gray Lady]

11 minutes ago, flgus said:

I hope you have better luck than I have,  submitted claim multiple times, called twice.  Have never been contacted or paid in maybe a year now.  

Did you turn in your claim to HAL for hotel reimbursement and per diem? Did you have insurance insurance at all? With more information, I may be able to give you some advice.

[flgus]

I submitted the HAL form by email after the travel insurance paid what they would.  Happily Travelguard paid most of my expenses.

[Gray Lady]

5 minutes ago, flgus said:

I submitted the HAL form by email after the travel insurance paid what they would.  Happily Travelguard paid most of my expenses.

My suggestion would be to call them back. First, ask for a claim number. If they don’t have one to give you, then ask what you can do to resend it (such as to a certain individual, etc) because if you don’t get something back soon, your attorney will be contacting them next. Just be very matter of fact about this, but firm. Also tell them that you will call the Washington State Attorney General’s office to file a claim with their consumer affair’s department if it isn’t handled promptly. It took us six months to get our money back, and we received it after saying we would contact the state attorney general. I didn’t want to follow through on that, but I would have if necessary. I found nice, firm, and patient to be the winning combo. Good luck!

 

[eggemon]

5 hours ago, Gray Lady said:

It took us six months to get our money back

We got our COVID expense reimbursement from HAL -- after much back-and-forth -- when we returned from our 2023 "make-up" cruise, which was exactly one year after we came down with COVID and missed out on our 2022 cruise. So, if you persevere, you may eventually succeed 😀