Sh!t.. holiday cancellation

[Inthefirepit]

We booked a TUI package holiday, we paid a large deposit and since had a baby (baby was added), baby is now 7mo and has severe allergies, dr doesn’t want us to go before seeing allergy team and dermatologist (dc can’t wear suncream due to severe allergies) referrals have been made but won’t be seen before holiday.

Baby has been in and out of hospital, blue lighted, I’m talking turned blue in my arms reactions.

TUI has said we can’t get refund on the large deposit because the flights were outsourced due to them not being able to provide them, they’ve said their policy with third party flights cannot be refunded 😔

We always buy our travel insurance in the weeks before going, so don’t have travel insurance 😢 is there anything we can do? Or just put it down to us being stupid for not getting insurance when we booked it last year.

If booked with a Credit card, call your card, they will know exactly where you stand and may be able to raise a dispute on your behalf, for free.

Can you catch covid or tell them you have and postpone?

Update; Thank you so much to everyone for the advice and compassion.

We’ve been on to TUI, spoke to a manager at a store (at unbeknownst to us it was booked by a store not the call centre), she was incredibly rude, said we will be 100% out of pocket on the large deposit and nothing they can do, she cannot ask anyone to help because she was the highest point of contact and no one would help us anyway, I explained numerous times that our baby is too ill to travel (including that we have a drs note and can’t get travel insurance because any is still under investigations), she was awful, zero empathy so..

we called the airline direct.. guess what.. we got 65% back within 4 minutes of being on the call! However it’s been refunded to TUI, TUI have said we get the money in the next 28 days after we chased and chased to see if they can give it us.

We have been booking holidays with TUI for over 10 years, never again, to be told “it’s not our fault you’ve cancelled your holiday, there’s nothing I can do, no one can help you” when my baby has recently turned blue in my arms and blue lighted to the hospital, too ill to take on a holiday to be told this, there was zero compassion I’m afraid however, by following some of your advice and going straight to the airline we managed to get atleast a decent chunk of the deposit back so thank you! - sorry if there’s typos, I’m currently breastfeeding said sickly baby 😆

Great result. Really hope baby is better soon xx

If you paid by credit card, you are insured.

Haven't read the full thread but in your position of be contacting one of those consumer champions you get in newspapers to see if they can plead your case. And/or complaining publicly on Twitter

I'm glad you got some money refunded, but if ever there was a case for having travel insurance in place as soon as you buy a holiday , this is it.

That’s an excellent update OP, glad that the airline was helpful.

Where does this leave you now in total? You got 65% of the cost of the flights back. How much deposit are TUI still holding onto and what exact term are they relying on to keep that money?
Or do you want them to keep that and apply it towards a new holiday when you eventually can travel?

One thing I would say is that you may actually have been quite lucky that the flights were paid in full to the airline on your behalf. This meant that the airline’s refund Ts and Cs applied to you, and they probably said something like “we will refund X% provided the cancellation is X weeks before travel”, reducing on a sliding scale the closer you got to departure.

If all the deposit money had stayed with TUI they might well have had the right to say “sorry, non-refundable deposit, it’s in the Ts and Cs”, rebook or lose it. (Though they should have communicated that with some empathy and regret).

I think the melanin in a black skin and muscle tone is quite different to a white skin.

I travel often and I went to Greece not long ago sun cream is needed especially for babies. My brother got sun stroke in London as a baby and he ended up in hospital.
There's reasons people apply sun cream... lots of things they didn't do back in the days because the medicals thought it was OK or it was unknown!

I've seen this posted on here before and tried to find out the details online without success. Can I ask @Blantw is it the case that if you book a holiday with a credit card you don't need to take out separate travel insurance? Is it for all types of credit card do you know. TiA

No it ai not the case that you are fully insured by paying by cc. Some cc used to offer travel insurance like bank accounts but few do now. You do have some additional consumer rights protection if the arrangements get disrupted, withdrawn or the supplier goes bust,

Thank you @LIZS , it's only because I've seen this said before that I wondered if I was wasting money on separate travel insurance. I know about the payment protection benefits

Yes @AllThatFancyPaintsAsFair as PP says SOME credit cards used to have travel insurance as a benefit. That's less common now. There's obviously still the usual consumer protection.

Cover is offered as part of a bank account now. I pay a monthly fee for my bank account and I get annual worldwide travel insurance, mobile phone insurance, AA breakdown cover and some other things I don't really need.

That’s great news op, 65% is a pretty high amount to be refunded.

That kind of travel insurance usually excludes pre-existing conditions. Pregnancy is usually counted as a pre-existing condition.

I’m sorry to hear this - stressful enough with new baby health issues without Tui being unsympathetic. I think if the T&Cs say you can alter the hol date for x admin fee it should be neither here nor there that Tui outsourced flights , as you booked a PACKAGE with them ? ( eg if the return flight had been cancelled Tui would still have to sort this, not you?). The whole point of a package is it is under Tui’s responsibility ( eg issues with the hotel - also outsourced , still fall to Tui) I think they might be trying it on. Tui can still use/ resell your holiday and accommodate you much later surely? Given a sick baby involved I think I’d press harder and threaten to go to consumer advice/ papers etc if they refuse to bend. Good luck.

@Inthefirepit check your bank benefits from all banks/credit cards. A lot of banks give you travel insurance as a part of the package with your bank account. Some of them are really basic and some of them are really good. Some also do phone cover and a car breakdown cover. It is worth having a look or asking your bank.

This is academic because OP did not buy insurance. However, it is not the existence of a baby that is the reason for cancelling, it is the fact that the baby has a health condition that prevents travel. That’s no different to an adult in the party becoming ill between booking and travel.

If insurance has been bought at the time of travel there would have been no pre-existing condition of relevance.

Sorry- if insurance had been bought at the time of BOOKING, I meant to say.

Sorry to be blunt but you answered your own question.

Holiday insurance is to cover all eventualities, not just things that happen whilst you're actually ON said holiday. Do you not listen to Martin Lewis? He's contamination telling people to buy their travel insurance as soon as they book their holiday.

So, as I said, you answered your own question .... you should have bought your insurance as soon as you booked the holiday, therefore its your own fault .... sorry for pointing out the obvious

Constantly not contamination ..... I hate autocorrect 😡 but then my own fault for not proofreading

I wonder if Martin Lewis would be able to help? He’s investigated lots of things like this with great success. TUI of late have a terrible reputation.

I’m so pleased you got some money back. I totally relate to being an allergy family and travel being stressful/impossible. Our DS is very allergic to lots of things and suffered anaphylaxis a good few times. He also had other health issues and I get the horror of the blue lights and prolonged hospital spells.

DS is now 3- his allergies are now stable and we had our first week away with him where we ate out and at the hotel most of the time. I’d never thought in a million years we’d be able to have a family holiday ever again when it felt like nothing we fed him was safe. The support from the allergy team has been game changing. Very best of luck with your DS and his future health.

I'm struggling to see what Tui has done wrong here.
If ever there was a clear advert for insurance this is it.
I feel sorry for OP but it's not the travel agents fault.

Incorrect.

Airlines are under no obligation whatsoever to refund if the plane takes off abc lands as planned. Your credit card company will not cover it if there’s no chance of them getting the money back.

Speaking from bitter experience. And god I tried everything….