Thomas Cook

[Di]

Oh well, fingers crossed that TC doesn't go t*ts up we've got two flights booked with them next year

[Deleted]

They may survive. It is serious though. Serious enough for one of the major air forums to go into "thread lock down".
Not a good time for all airlines. We have lost another well known charter carrier this month - Astraeus. Good, respectable airline. Sad.

[daisy]

Must admit I was very :owhen i saw the news

Keeping my fingers crossed for you Di

[Di]

Think they will probably be ok, but shame about Astraeus, we flew with them a couple of times and they were great. I was more worried about losing the accommodation costs if the worst happened and we couldn't get another flight so checked my insurance (flights were paid for by credit card). Surprise surprise, in the small print right at he bottom (general exclusions) is a clause which says "Any liability resulting either directly or indirectly
from any supplier of travel or associated services ceasing to trade". Rang to check and they confirmed we wouldn't be covered so have now taken out new cover with Nat West.

Moral of this story, always read right to the end of a document

[muriman]

Di, that's rather similar to travel insurance exclusions in some circumstances of missed flight caused by cancellation or other failure of scheduled public transport to get you to the airport for travel home. As I posted some months ago, most travel insurance policies do not cover failure of public transport where this is caused by a public authority - including, for our purposes, a harbour authority or port police - enforcing cancellation or delay of a ferry service because of bad weather. (It might be interesting to know if your NatWest policy has this exclusion.) The moral probably is that it's not really feasible to cover all possible eventualities with insurance, so anybody who travels has to take some financial risk, to know its extent, and plan accordingly.
Incidentally, according to today's news TC has obtained the necessary backing from its banks.

[Deleted]

I think TC will survive this issue. I would be very surprised if they survive in their present form. It would appear, as of this moment anyhow, that anyone holding a reservation should be OK. To make a booking from this time on may require some deep thought and a long look at the alternatives.

[Di]

Hi Muriman, still waiting for the policy to arrive to check the small print, but I set out the scenario (TC goes bust, can't get another flight so have to cancel accommodation as no way of getting there) and the lady at Nat West said we would be covered. Apparently we are also covered for airline failure .... handy . As it is, it looks like TC are ok - at least until 2013

[maria]

Ouch - just booked Birmingham to Rhodes in September. Over £665 for 2 of us including £16 for paying on a credit card (didn't dare use a debit card given TCs situation) and £64 for 20kg each of luggage.

That doesn't include food or paying extra to sit together

[Di]

Hi Maria

I know the feeling ours cost just under £700 from Manchester, although that does include meals and allocated seats. It was still considerably cheaper than Thomson though and does (provided there are no considerable delays) get us into Rhodes in time to catch the cat to Tilos - which avoids having to pay 90 odd quid for a hotel and an extra 20euros on the ferry the following day

I know easyjet do it cheaper (and would get us in at a reasonable time) but I really can't be a **ed having to do a 100m sprint to get a decent seat (you have to walk / run across the runway at Liverpool). Speedy booking used to be an option, but everyone's booking it now which defeats the object

[maria]

Hi Di

I looked at Easyjet from Gatwick but there wasn't a lot of difference in price and Birmingham's 30 mins closer for us. Plus Easyjet was 5.45am flight and TC is 7am. Thomson from Birmingham would have been at least £30 more than what we paid.

Must book the on-airport parking at Birmingham. Last time we flew from there our sat nav refused to find the off-site parking place we'd booked and paid for, we were running out of time so had to sling the car into an on-site carpark and ended up paying twice to park.

[carol]

Just to make you both feel better,we have paid more than that, Fergie and I out of Bham 29/8/12 for 3weeks paid £726 with Thomson and the husbands from Bham 5/9/12 paid £806 same flight leaving at 7am it is an awful lot of money isnt it ? We booked very early as Bham is much more convenient for us but it will be interesting to see if the prices drop at all although it is probably best not to look

[maria]

£806, that's dreadful. I looked at Easyjet's prices in November I think, I think they've gone up since then. Silly really I should have booked earlier, but we were toying with the idea of spending a few days in Rhodes on the way out or back and I was struggling to try and fit my work around it. As it happens we can only manage the week.

[Liz]

806 !!! ....there is no way I'd pay that for a flight to Greece however much I loved a place ( no offence )
we only paid 300 each to go to Dubai !

[maria]

It really is getting dreadfully expensive to visit Halki now. Bearing in mind we've got 630 euros to pay for the accommodation, plus there's taxis and ferries as well.

We had a week in Skiathos last Sept for £1100 B&B in a 4 star hotel which was lovely. No standing in a bowl to collect water when you're having a shower there!

[carol]

Yes I agree with both of you, it is a dreadful price but we had to weigh up the cost from Bham against travelling to Gatwick from Cardiff ( hate that journey ) spending night before and after in a hotel and Graeme losing another days holiday getting home on the thursday, in the end we went with the Bham option. You are right Maria, it is becoming a very expensive holiday on all counts, it wont stop us going yet but it will probably stop some people