To think it's far more expensive to book holidays separately.

[Laura221]

Ok, so we were meant to be in greece today but as thomas cook have gone bust I'm sat at home trying to book another holiday for may half term. I've seen a lot of tweets surprised (and almost blaming) it's due to the fact it's cheaper to buy everything thing separately. However I've looked at flights to get to zante and it's almost £2.5k when the full holiday all inclusive with tui is just over £3k. What am I doing so wrong that I cant find all of these components of a holiday for less than a travel agent?

If any of you want to find me a nice holiday in may half term for 5 all inclusive for £3k then please be my guest haha

Where did you see flights to Zante? Did you use a price comparison site like Skyscanner to find the best prices?

We had our May holiday booked with Thomas Cook (first holiday in 6 years!)

I've noticed some posters have been quite sneery about package holidays / booking so far in advance but for us it was the ideal.

Everything booked and we were paying it off in monthly instalments? I actually can't face looking for a replacement holiday at the moment and given the fact we are going to have to wait an age for our money back we may well leave the May holiday altogether!

[I appreciate that it's most important to deal with all the people who need repatriation etc.. but I can't see it being an easy and simple process to get our money back. DD as opposed to CC]

I’ve always found it cheaper to book separately

For that kind of holiday often packages can be cheaper, especially including transfers and if you need to factor in insurance too. Just depends on what it is you want.

We were due to go to Zante in a couple of weeks and I've been finding the same!
Our holiday was to Louis Plagos, and a week there direct is only about £100 less than what I paid all in with Thomas Cook.

I'm not sure booking separately being cheaper does apply to all inclusive packages in school holidays. It does when you want a city break - Easyjet flight, booking.com, job done.

The airport is a factor - you don't get as many budget options from Heathrow or Manchester as you do from Stansted or Gatwick.

For us it's almost always been cheaper to book separately. We've been on quite a few AI holidays where the hotel is officially a TUI or First Choice holiday village type of thing, where the TUI package price has been way more expensive. You have to sort out your own airport transfers, but that's usually pretty straight forward. My experience with reps when we've had issues hasn't been that positive, so it doesn't bother me that I don't have them there to call on.

I've also found it cheaper to book separately. I've found the same flights provided by the holiday company for hundreds of pounds cheaper. I only book the hotel through them.

We usually SC villa with pool in may/june or late August school hols. Definitely cheaper to book separately. The cost of a package is 🤑🤑🤑🤑

Much cheaper to book separately

Right now the prices will have gone through the roof because so many people are trying to rebook. They will settle down again.

Have a look at Skyscanner.net to find the cheapest prices across a month.

I think you have to compare like for like. We have just got back from a two week holiday in Cyprus. Yes we could have found a package holiday £300 cheaper but we would have ended up in one bedroom, shitty cooking facilities and a pool to share with a whole crowd of tourists. That does not appeal to me. For £300 extra we had a two bedroom property with its own pool and a rented car.

8 think it tends to be cheaper to book city breaks and non resort type holidays separately. But when I've looked at booking separately for places like Greek Islands (where there are mainly packages) it's more expensive. Also I think it depends where you fly from. The regional airport near us is pricy for non packages and poor on choice so we're driving 4 HR to Stanstead later this week to fly to a city in Europe.

Book separately, and early.
Last week there was a thread of people that had been up at 6am to book Easy Jet flights just as they were released www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/3696228-Anyone-booked-any-good-bargain-flights-with-easy-jet-today Some great flight prices to be had.
It also takes a lot of research, but after a few hours of researching this weekend I’ve booked half board, in the Negev desert, with a swimming pool for £100 a night for two!
Some great hotels to be found in Greece on Booking.com if you venture to the lesser touristic islands.

Ok so what websites do I use? Skyscanner for flights and then where for a villa/hotel. Sorry if I seem a bit stupid, probably a bit of stress is giving me a foggy head. Thanks for all your replies. Those of you who have just replied you've found it cheaper but no info would you mind expanding and let me know the last time you booked what websites you have used?

I also find it much cheaper to book separately, but we always go for self catering houses or apartments, not hotels, so that may make a difference.

My niece is a bit older than my lot and I went away with her and her friend with all their parents. We went AI which as a childfree adult (at the time), I wasn't impressed BUT DB and SIL assured me that they eat out at least 1 x per day and drinks for the kids make it worthwhile. Then I saw that DN and friend literally had 30+ drinks per day. Plus there were always snacks on tap. The amount saved meant they could do big activities. I'm going to stick with that too.

I've never done a package holiday, but I nearly choke when people describe how they spend thousands on these sorts of holidays. I've never spent close to that on a holiday in my life.

I look at budget airlines usually for flights (if to Europe, Easyjet or Ryanair, if other places, it depends, often use Kayak to get an idea of different carriers) and then Airbnb as we always do self-catering. We cook some meals ourselves, grab a quick coffee and a pastry for a few euros for breakfast, splurge on dinners out and drinks. Often try to book a place with nice outdoor space, so we can do pre-dinner drinks at home (bottle of wine from a shop) instead of paying to sit in a restaurant or bar and do it. We do free or low cost activities and might splurge on an expensive activity to do if it's something we really want. I'm going to Spain next week for 3 nights (flight was £90, 2 bed flat was £300 something - more than I'd wanted to pay but I left it very late to book as I was just too busy, I get the bus from the airport which is like 10 eur return, then it's just food and drinks for 3 nights/4 days, some of which I'll buy myself at the market). I'm just going by myself, but if I was taking dh or dc, it would be more expensive, but no where near £3000 for a week).

You’re now looking at a school holiday period - peak - when the holiday you had planned was off peak.

Not rocket science.

When you book all inclusive you choose who you fly with and what flight times the same as doing it separately. You will not get a nice hotel cheaper. The rooms are block booked. Not unless it’s a last minute cancellation and these days hotels would rather an empty room. Day trips whilst on holiday is cheaper to sort out yourself. Taxi
Booking can be 10x the price and buses are not just for locals. Car hire is cheaper to find offsite as well.

@Laura221 OP I've gone directly to the hotel website and booked on there. For villas etc there are websites such as Owners Direct.
With flights, if you type the times / dates you want into the Google search box, it should come up with the available options. Or use Skyscanner, or direct on the budget airlines websites.

I might be wrong but I don’t think Easy Jet release their next seasons flights for Greece until the end of September. It might be worth waiting another week or so before looking.

Sorry about your holiday, that must be a real bummer

@CCquavers that's not true. The holiday I went on over summer was £1000 cheaper booked separately than with TUI. The big companies have to make their money somewhere!

Google flights is more up to date and imo more user friendly than Skyscanner. You can instantly see the prices for a whole month and if you use an Android phone you get push alerts for significant price drops.

google.co.uk/flights

Skyscanner is good for finding cheapest flights if you are flexible about where you go, using everywhere as destination and using same function to see all routes to /from a particular airport, but for everything else I prefer Google flights.

Secret Flying website free emails for bargain alerts.

Booking dot com is good for finding places, but can be cheaper to book direct as booking and similar sites charge 15% commission as a base and up to 25% for being featured, being the deal of the day and for being shown higher up in the search results etc. Use the filters. Use cashback sites for 10% or so cashback.

Before booking Google the name of the accommodation and see if their own site is cheaper, also worth phoning or emailing them and asking nicely for best price for booking direct.

Flights - low cost airlines like EasyJet it Ryanair (booked as early as possible to get the lowest fares)
Accommodation - hotel comparison sites like booking.com, trivago or go directly to a hotel if you're interested in a particular place. Homeaway.co.uk or Airbnb for privately rented apartments or villas.
Transfers - car hire or ask hotel or wherever you have booked to stay to recommend a taxi company.