Peace of Mind

With Hurricane Matthew having torn its way across the Caribbean and the Florida coast and and Typhoon Haima raging in the Far East, many Cruise ships had to seek shelter in port or re-route to avoid it as well as hotels having to batten down the hatches causing holiday misery for many.

It begs the question of how safe is your holiday?

Over my 30 years in travel I have seen many disasters that have affected the travel plans of hundreds of people, like 9-11, The Icelandic Volcano, many weather events like hurricanes and severe snow, and companies going bust, all of which caused disruptions to flights, left people stranded or unable to travel but because the customers I dealt with had booked with me and through an ABTA and ATOL bonded agency we were able to change their flights, get them out to their holiday if a little late, re-route them, get them home, change their holiday to another date and generally take as much worry out of the situation as possible for them.

Others were not so lucky though. During the Volcanic ash crisis for example, I was working in a high street agency and we were inundated with people calling and coming into the office as they had relatives stranded or were due to go away themselves and were wanting advice and help.

We of course offered advice but could not get involved in plans we had not made.

I often book cruise only deals for customers who then arrange their own flights and perhaps hotels etc. Sometimes they may see this as a cheaper option. Sometimes it is, but not always as we often get special rates to use with the cruise lines for our packages which cannot be sold as cruise only prices. But money is not everything. What if something went wrong? You would have to deal with it yourself and this could have a huge financial implication.

One example I have is recently a customer headed off to check in for a flight to Hawaii to join a cruise. On arrival at the airport she discovered her flight had been cancelled from the halfway change over point and the airline had not advised anyone. Calling me from the Airport in a Panic as you can imagine, I set about solving the issue for her. After a tense hour for her I managed to get her a flight to New York, an overnight hotel and an onward flight to Hawaii so she did not miss her cruise and without her having to pay out again. If she had booked the flights herself, she would have had to buy new flights and perhaps the Hotel and try and sort it out when she got back home which in some cases people could not afford to do?

So when we tell people that our Packages are bonded and safe, we really mean it.

Can you put a price on peace of mind?

What are your thoughts?