Dear Tripped Up,

Who needs you? After we first connected, you said you’d take on my problem. But while you dawdled working on other travelers’ issues, I got my money back from that dastardly airline/travel site/car rental agency on my own. — Sam Q. Traveler, Everywhere

Dear Readers,

Sam is right. If you are wowed by my knack for getting answers and squeezing refunds out of airlines, hotels and other travel providers, temper your reaction slightly. It’s the “nytimes.com” part of my email address that does most of the work, an incantation that bypasses the exasperating mess of online bots, interactive phone menus (“Representative!!!!”) and front-line customer-service agents. Instead, I’m connected with a usually attentive media relations department.

What’s more impressive, really, is the number of readers who manage to resolve big travel frustrations without a big name or an influential email address. Roughly one-third of readers I initially offer to help no longer need me by the time their issue gets to the front of the line.

So for my final column of 2024, I will share strategies from do-it-yourselfers who found successful ways to get their cases in front of a sympathetic eyes and ears and receive recourse.

The government can help

A modest request to the incoming Trump administration: Please retain the U.S. Transportation Department’s surprisingly simple air travel service complaint form — and the federal workers who read the submissions — as the resource helped many readers this year, including Asa of Minneapolis.Asa and his family traveled to Europe for a ski vacation in February, flying Delta and KLM, but their luggage was delayed. Without winter clothes and ski equipment, the family, Asa said, bought only the basics and rented what they could, but in the pricey ski town of Andermatt, Switzerland, they still spent $5,200. The family meticulously saved itemized receipts and submitted them to KLM. (The airline that flies the final leg is the point of contact for lost luggage, according to the Montreal Convention, an international treaty governing lost luggage on most international flights.)

KLM sent Asa $864, with no explanation. He then researched the Montreal Convention himself and found that airlines were required to reimburse reasonable expenses up to about $1,700 per traveler. He filed two new claims to KLM, complained to the Department of Transportation online and, in May, wrote to me.

I said I would help, but it might take a while. “Sounds great,” he wrote. “In the meantime, I’ll continue being a thorn in the side of KLM!”

He wouldn’t need to be. Days later, on June 2, he got an email from KLM acknowledging his complaint with the Transportation Department and asking for him to resubmit the receipts and provide his bank account information. Though he would have to submit them several more times, he received the full amount — the remainder of the $5,200, minus $864 already received — on June 18.

Jasper Koek, a spokesperson for the airline, wrote to me: “KLM sincerely apologizes for the inconvenience caused by the delayed arrival of the family’s luggage and the time it took to resolve the issue. We are committed to ensuring that our customers receive the best possible service, and we regret that this situation did not meet our usual standards.”

The online form from the Transportation Department, a federal agency, only works for airline issues. But I have also heard from readers who successfully complained to state attorneys general (in their home state, not the business’s state) and state insurance departments, for travel insurance claims.

Use the “chargeback” option after a credit-card purchase

When Kemi of New York City never received a refund from Booking.com after canceling a $1,260 flight to Africa, she got the site’s attention by filing a “chargeback,” or asking her credit card issuer to return the money.

This is a risky move, so first, some words of advice about this approach: Be sure the rules are on your side.

For snafus over smaller-ticket items, companies often give up without a fight, deciding not to contest the chargeback. But with more costly disputes, they may fight back and win, especially if the consumer’s case is not well documented. Companies have also been known to blacklist customers or, as I wrote about in August, find other ways to make customers’ lives miserable.

But the strategy worked for Kemi, because she was right. Through Booking.com, she had reserved an EgyptAir flight from New York to Abuja, Nigeria, on March 27. But on March 14, EgyptAir pushed her flight back a day, a scheduling change that didn’t work for her.

As was very clearly her right, she requested a refund and booked a new and more expensive flight with United Airlines. She was regularly in touch with Booking.com, which told her it had requested the refund from EgyptAir, to no avail.

So about a month later she called her credit card issuer, which tentatively refunded the charge and, by June 22, finalized the dispute in her favor.

Sage Hunter, a spokesperson for Booking.com, confirmed the story and said the agency did eventually get the money back from the airline. EgyptAir did not respond to my questions.

File a small-claims-court case

Note: I didn’t say, “Go to small claims court.” This year, several readers got in touch with me to share that simply filing cases led to their receiving a response and eventually a resolution from the company.

Zlati of New York City shared that her daughter tried to cancel a $4,575 reservation within 24 hours of purchase on the website for TAP Air Portugal, but she could not get the website to process the refund, which is required by law.

Zlati filed a case in Essex County, N.J., where TAP’s U.S. operations are based. After some back-and-forth, the airline did not accept fault but paid the family back (plus $42 in court fees!) on the condition that the case was dismissed. At least three other readers had similar success with other airlines.

In a way, that’s surprising, because TAP and the others almost certainly could have won the case had the carriers showed up in court, thanks to the federal Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, which preempts state consumer laws on airline pricing and services.

Ganesh Sitaraman, a law professor at Vanderbilt University and the author of “Why Flying Is Miserable and How to Fix It,” said that the Supreme Court has interpreted that legislation’s oversight “expansively,” meaning small-claims courts are the wrong venues to fight the airlines.

For Zlati, however, it still worked. My best guess is that TAP opted to settle rather than pay for a lawyer to sit for hours in an obscure county courtroom. (TAP did not respond to my request for comment.)

And remember, the federal deregulation law applies only to airlines. Barbara from Florida sued Greyhound in small-claims court, after an incorrect address on her $26 ticket led her to miss a bus. She won a default judgment, and she said Greyhound paid her $500. (The bus line did not respond to my request for comment.)

Follow up, persistently and politely

Adam of Los Angeles didn’t need to go to court when Dollar charged him $495 for a vehicle upgrade he did not agree to. Instead he used the most common and easiest way to fight a case: persistently following up, politely but firmly, on multiple fronts.

Adam rented a Nissan Rogue in Boston in March for what he thought would be a total of $583. But when the bill came, it was for $1,201, which included $495, plus tax, for a “vehicle upgrade,” in this case from a “Jeep Compass or similar.”

He said he did not agree to the upgrade, and I believe him, in part because that is a crazy amount to pay for a slightly roomier SUV, but mostly because he kept the printed, highlighted rental agreement that listed his total estimated charges as $583, no upgrade mentioned.

He filed a complaint via the Dollar website and was told he would receive a refund. But a few days later he received an email reversing the decision from a worker who attached an image of an electronic agreement that included the $495 charge.

But Adam just replied with a copy of his receipt. “No upgrade was discussed or agreed to,” he wrote (politely but firmly). “Please refund the upgrade charge of $495 immediately.”

The next day he filed a separate complaint via direct message on X to @DollarCars. That, too, was denied for the same reason.

He also wrote to me, but before I could get on the case, Dollar refunded him.

There was more he could have done if that hadn’t worked. Adam could have searched for other contacts at Dollar, which would have revealed it is owned by Hertz, another avenue to complain. (A spokesperson for Hertz said she was “glad it has already been resolved.”)

There is a catch to all these strategies: You have to be right. So as you set out on your 2025 adventures, keep in mind that not every travel problem qualifies for a refund or compensation. But document everything for those that do.