Under the extreme circumstances why would anybody think they could afford or able to refund? The property like so many others was almost totally destroyed and insurance companies are jerking and everybody around. Many hotels etc are just not able to refund until insurance kicks in and then they will be lucky if the get 25% of their claim. I'm Sure these room refunds are a pittance to what they have already lost and will never recover. I would not want to be in their shoes. The headache to deal with that plus pissed of guests. Travel insurance is widely available and cheap if you don't want to take the risk.
Oh, they can afford to refund deposits. No company should be using customer deposits as operating capital. Customers' REFUNDABLE deposits should be placed in an 'escrow'-type account upon receipt for just that reason. It really should have nothing to do with insurance companies or anything else. Club O is just jerking everyone around, and having to wait almost 4 months for a refund is inexcusable. If they have internet enough to know who donated their deposits and who didn't, then they have internet enough to respond directly to a refund request. Sending a computer-generated standard response form over and over for months on end is just wrong. We had booked our trip through Jim Ruos and initially contacted him regarding our refund. Unfortunately, he was in the same boat as the rest of us as far as getting any kind of decent response from Club O. He was the one who suggested we try contacting them directly at reservations@cluborient.com. No doubt they are a bit overwhelmed with emails at the moment, but that's not an excuse to not directly respond to their customers.
As far as travel insurance goes, we had that too and, in fact, initially tried to go that route when we weren't getting any response from Club O. The insurance company told us they could do nothing until Club Orient showed a response that they could not, or would not, refund anyone's deposit. So stuck in limbo yet again. Sorry, but there is no excuse for this type of delay any longer. Internet has been up and running. We just stayed persistent and kept emailing Florence until we received our refund - finally. We suggest you do the same.
Edited to add: this has little to do with patience either. Four months is a long time for most people. Not everyone can afford to lose 500 euros. Some of us booked other vacations in place of our Club O trip and could have used that money to do so. Sorry, this is wrong on so many levels.
