To think you should be able to transfer a holiday?

[FFOXGLOVE]

I’ve never had to try and do anything like this before …..
but basically my elderly parents booked a last minute trip away through an independent travel agent but then my dad came down with a chest infection and now they don’t want to go.

They wanted to transfer the holiday to me and my partner so it wasn’t wasted as they knew there was no way of getting money back.

the travel agent booked flights through Tui and accommodation through someone called JETSET.
I was expecting to pay charges to sort it out but not to be told it’s just not possible.
Tui will change the name on one flight only so we have to buy another ticket … okay fine.
but JETSET / the hotel are reusing to make any changes - I mean it affects them the least!

anyway we can’t take it up and I’m just gutted for my parents.

am I being unreasonable?

Surely they should claim on their travel insurance

It is their issue to resolve

They are claiming on the insurance now - or trying to.

re all the people saying touts would buy all the tickets if changes were allowed… not really as we’re happy to pay charges to change it just not the whole cost of the holiday! I understand it shouldn’t be completely easily changeable. We’d provide proof of identiy etc so I do feel like they just don’t want to help because it’s not worth their while an that goes for the travel agents and the agencies (jetset) they used to book.

re safeguards - just the human touch of advising them that nothing was changeable not dates not duration - literally nothing.
my parents didn’t need to book last minute - nor were they after a particular cheap deal - they just wanted to go to Fuerteventura to a hotel they’d been to many times before.

don’t feel like it’s asking for the moon for people to be a bit less mercenary!

I think the point with touts is that if you want a booking to be transferable at a cost cheaper than paying in full again, that creates the business opportunity for touting.

Fingers crossed the insurance can sort it anyway. And I agree it would be better if things were spelled out more clearly on booking.

Yes but people are suggesting there should be easy ways to swap tickets and there should be safeguards put in place. I am asking what those safeguards should be. They don’t want it to be a hypothetical problem.

There is a Facebook page where I have seen people selling holidays which people are unable to go on.
It normally involves paying for all the name changes.
However, these may be package holidays, which are sold at a discount to the original bookers.

I expect it depends on the T&Cs of the flights, hotels, transfers etc

We had a situation where the people were travelling with couldn’t go so we wanted to transfer it. The company we booked through offered zero and we stood to lose a lot of money. So we changed the flight names ourselves for a fee and I contacted the hotel directly and said the people on the booking can’t travel can we change the names and they did it for free they just changed the names.

The issue is that you can't change the lead booker. That person has to travel.

my parents didn’t need to book last minute - nor were they after a particular cheap deal - they just wanted to go to Fuerteventura to a hotel they’d been to many times before.
I get this. When you have health problems, especially things that flare up and then disappear, it's often better to book last minute when you're feeling well. Just bad luck to catch a chest infection so near to travel. I know it's not relevant now but also worth mentioning that if they had spoken to travel insurance company to declare the chest infection there's every possibility the insurance company would tell them to cancel anyway. This happened to us. I presume the risk of needing expensive treatment abroad is compared with the cost to the insurer of cancellation.

This might sound stupid but when you check into a hotel, regardless of the booking route etc., they don't know the names or details of everyone on the booking and very rarely do you all have to be there at once... Plus other people book for friends / family all the time... So could you try and find out what the checking in process is at the hotel? If it's just show them the booking confirmation then it shouldn't be a problem? Seems absurd that it's impossible to transfer a room!

I was actually going to suggest this 😀

It depends on local legislation. For example, in Spain now it is a legal requirement for hotels to verify the identity of all guests on the booking, usually by passport checks.

They most likely will know the names of the people, but I don’t think they care too much if the names are changed it’s still being paid for and used the same way. We just called the hotel in Spain direct and they changed the names. We also changed the flights. We never mentioned it to the company we booked through. They were wanting to charge the full cost of the holiday to cancel which we didn’t want to do obviously.
Ot probably has some implications for atol because the names had changed but we didn’t care much about that or even think about it at the time

We tried and tried to change things via the hotel (in fuerteventura) but they wouldn’t budge.

we didn’t want to risk going all that way and paying for the flight changes only to find ourselves without accommodation!

so they’re going through the insurance now. My dad has asked the doctor for a not fit to travel note and the insurance company are sending documentation to be filled out.
I hope the insurance sort it for them - then they can think about going later in the year.

they’ve always loved a little holiday and I hate to think they’ll never go again!

I would leave the hotel a review. I think it's absolutely shocking customer service. What difference does it make to the hotel what name is on the booking?!?

For once, I feel sorry for insurance companies who have to pay out because hotels refuse to change a name on a booking.

We’ve had an instance where someone has sold 4 seats on Facebook. They’ve got the money and given the reference number to the buyer, then disappeared, uncontactable, ignoring efforts to reach them. Not their problem anymore. Buyer calls us with only the reference number, no other details, not even the lead bookers name. We cannot in good faith just take their word that they’re authorised to change every detail on that booking to their own (because we’ve also had instances when people have tried to do that maliciously).

If you’d booked a holiday and a nutty ex or troublemaking family member had just been able to boot you off your own booking and go on it themselves you’d be pissed off, wouldn’t you?

I was on holiday when the covid lockdown started
I had booked 2 more weeks in another location
Booking.com refunded the full price of the accomodation quickly (it was not a package holiday)

Multiple flights were cancelled, we were offered vouchers & most of the money back

We booked with another airline to return

In your first example, the travel company will have the original bookers contact details. If they are concerned that the original booker is committing fraud by selling the reference number on but not actually doing what needs to e done to facilitate the booking transfer, hopefully the company will pass the relevant details to the police to support an investigation.

In your second example, again that is fraud/stealing someone's holiday and I'm not sure how it relates at all to the original poster's comments.

More examples of how quite extreme scenarios, wholly unrelated to gdpr, are used to not provide a reasonable service because of 'gdpr'.

I read it as one example.
Yes it is fraud and that is why transferring holidays is a problem.

It's not a problem though when the lead passenger calls you, goes through all the security questions and asks to change a name providing medical evidence that they can't go. That's entirely different to your Facebook example

This applies across Europe and (for overseas visitors) in the UK. I think you will find few countries in the world that do nor require passports or photo identity cards verification on hotel check in.

My facebook example?

Where have I given an example?

I booked NYC with virgin and then Covid hit so was allowed to change the date, I changed it to the following summer I think and then due to certain reasons could no longer go, virgin weren’t allowing a change in name at all, think it was only 2 weeks before the flight, the only reason they stated they would allow is if the travelling person had Covid. I managed to get a positive Covid email (they were easy to edit and had one from the year before) and this is the only way they’d accept change

I was talking about @FettleOfKish 's example in the quote history. I thought your response was to the quote history

I think the doctor will issue a not fit to travel letter in this case as even though your df is over the chest infection he is not mentally fit to travel. Travel insurance is so expensive for people in their 80s (my parents are 83 and 84 and love travelling) and they need to be notified of every new medical issue and medication. Dm has had a few problems in the past few months and df is having eye surgery next week so won't be able to fly for at least a month. They normally renew immediately the last one expired but haven't this time.

Please do not leave a bad review for the travel agent, it is not their fault. Whilst they can argue with Jetset (who are generally a reputable supplier) on your behalf, ultimately they can't do anything if Jetset won't budge.

If he has lost confidence, his GP may issue a not fit to fly certificate (if they won't maybe worth trying a private online doctor). After my dad had a heart attack, the Dr would probably have issued a fit to fly, but because he (or rather my mum) didn't feel he was, they took that into account.

PS I'm an ex travel agent who spent many years battling with suppliers on behalf of customers

this is why I don’t buy packages any more. Airlines and hotels are much more flexible if you buy seperately — they’ll even refund or give vouchers more easily in ‘atol protected’ situations.