To think flights should be ATOL protected? Thomas Cook

[ShitFuckBastardBollocks]

Why is it just package holidays? Why not flights?

Booked my first ever family holiday and had no idea about ATOL protection not applying if you bought flights separately to the accommodation.

I got insurance.

Told this insurance does not cover airline bankruptcy/failure.

Called insurance and they said I cannot upgrade to Flight protection insurance because its now a known issue and it won't be valid

So I've spend 2600 on flights and my insurance is wank and I'm not ATOL protected.

So if I fly out and Thomas Cook go under how do I get home? I do not have the money to pay for flight s home

Does this mean I have to just abandon my holiday? :(

Ive been crying all afternoon.

This was supposed to be our first family holiday abroad and its just turned into hell

My partner and I heard about Thomas Cook’s issues a few months back and took out insurance with SAFI (not as common as people seem to think it is/it should be).

After hearing the news a couple days ago we checked our insurance and found out that the £250 excess is per person, not per booking. Our flights were £300 each so this makes the entire thing almost completely pointless. It doesn’t say this in our policy doc, just what we were told on the phone so hopefully we can still get around that.

Can’t really afford a £250 excess anyway though!

Really upset because this is our honeymoon, had it booked since May and am desperate for some time away as I haven’t gone on holiday for so long. I’ll speak to our bank about getting the money back although we paid via debit card too.

We spoke to someone at Thomas Cook on Friday who said that the press were taking everything out of context and the £200m is for future investments, they won’t go under without it. But who knows!

Remember the atol cover isn't free, you pay for it - I think it was £2.80 per person for my last holiday (first packaged trip I had done in 20 years, I'm sold, so easy when there's delays, tui sorted everything). I must say though I paid £26 for annual European cover with cruise cover, safi and end supplier failure, it isn't expensive compared to the cost of holidays, but package protection is better, it's what you are paying for.

I feel sorry for those who may lose holidays BUT I feel far sorrier for those who may lose their jobs

OP I understand you’re upset about your holiday but there are so many people who are going to lose their jobs, ‘I hope they go bust’ is incredibly selfish. You shouldn’t have booked a holiday that you clearly couldn’t afford and now I understand you being angry but maybe think about all the people who will lose a lot more than £3000~

When are you due to fly OP?
Unless it's today, by tonight/ tomorrow you should know wether they got the funding and holidays are going ahead, or they have gone bust and you will get a refund.
If it is today, just go, they have to get you back home.
It's all crazy, I'm meant to be flying out to get married in 12 days and i don't even know if it's going to go ahead, I have two excited kids and everything for a wedding, I know I will get my holiday money back but not sure about the (not cheap) wedding package.
But there's gonna be people much worse off than me, and staff wondering how they are going to feed the kids and pay the bills, that's who I feel for!

If you can't get a refund**

@Slappadabass bless you, I hope everything works out and you get your wedding day

Why should the Govt repatriate holiday makers and or bailout a private company - they didn't provide £43m to keep a steel plant afloat.

I wonder how many people who voted to leave the EU are now looking at EU regulation to protect themselves?

I'd have thought the OP would want TC to get additional finance and her holiday goes ahead without a hitch, 22000 jobs rely on this company.

Slap

I’m with @Marnie76

I’m disabled also & know how much effort a holiday is but I would never ever ever wish a company go bust & people lose their jobs.

My cousin works for them & is currently feeling stressed about her future not some bloody holiday.

I’ll be losing three holidays and flights if they go bust. Will be gutting about the holidays but they are package holidays. I’m on disability benefits, so having the option to pay monthly over 16-18 months to go away with friends is the only way I can do it.
However I feel more sorry for the uncertainty and worry for the families who’s jobs will be lost. I can only imagine how stressful this time is right now. Mortgage, rent, bills etc I bet they feel sick.

But I can’t see the government helping they haven’t in the passed and allowed other companies to go bust, so why now? how many months would it see them through? Just the winter period then what? And they are back in the same boat with the government losing 200 million and never seeing it back.

I’m not sure what the great benefit is of them going bust for you OP? You won’t get the holiday and it will be months before you get anything back. If they don’t go bust you get the holiday. If they go bust when you’re on holiday (unlikely unless you’re flying in the next couple of days), you’ll almost certainly be repatriated by the government. So them not going bust and 22,000 people not losing their jobs seems like a pretty good outcome for you too.

Helsbells obviously I don't want anyone to be out of a job but as someone on disability benefits who has saved nonstop for a year+ to pay for our first holiday abroad I would rather have the money back in my bank and book elsewhere with proper insurance now rather than be at the mercy of such a wobbly company.

You are extraordinarily selfish. Thousands of people could lose their livelihoods.

You were also insane to buy such an expensive holiday that you clearly can't afford. There are loads of ways to have a cheap holiday, even overseas. There are four of us and I've never paid anywhere near what you have for flights.

But above all I can't get past you repeatedly saying you hope they go bust even when people have literally posted on this thread explaining how it will affect their families. So so selfish.

The government probably won’t help out, but there are reasons why it might. It’s a different government, who’ve never been in this situation before (BJ is totally unpredictable and might just decide to do it). They’ll be concerned about people thinking the collapse is due to the risk of no deal Brexit. The rescue amount needed is less than the cost of repatriation, not even taking into account the costs of unemployment.

22,000 people finding out what a shitstorm the benefits system is just before a very close election. That could swing a few seats.

Thanks for that OP, I work for TC and like all
my colleagues, haven’t slept a wink all night for for worrying about what will happen. Nice to know so many people hope we go under.

Hairy let's just keep everything crossed for a fucking miracle

@HairyPotter I hope your job is saved. So sorry that you’re going through this.

Hopefully this is a lesson learned but worst case scenario is you'll have to dip into savings. Hopefully it won't come to that OP and you get to have a lovely holiday!

@HairyPotter hopefully you’ll get some good news.

We’re lucky we can book another holiday, I hope that if the worst happens you find a lovely new employer.

Makes me sick you’re here wanting a company to go bust OP when thousands of people’s jobs are at stake. Your holiday funded by your obviously over generous disability benefits has been funded by their taxes!

When are you flying? The media suggests today is male or break day so things should be clearer by tomorrow.

@MLMhun oh FFS. The OP lives in the UK. Her disability benefits will certainly not be over generous. Just because she’s said something ridiculous, there’s no need to move immediately into Daily Mail disability hate talking points.

Meeting taking place right now

@moonbeambonnet ok, so being able to drop over £2k on flights and the subsequent costs of a holiday is living on the breadline is it?

So you think disabled people should be kept on the breadline do you? Just enough to eat and a little bit of roof above their heads? Nice, that'll teach them.