Will you go ahead with Easter travel plans

[BackInTime]

Just curious as to whether people that have holidays booked over Easter plan to go ahead with their trips?

DSis is on the one hand insisting that her DCs primary should shut but at the same time has no intention of cancelling her family holiday in Europe over Easter

We have Venice booked for early April, a really special trip we have saved for ages to go on, staying 5* on a non changeable or refundable room rate...urgh. Airlines seem to still be flying, albeit with empty planes to preserve their slots (apparently if the airlines repeatedly cancel their flights then their existing route slots become under threat) and obviously airlines don't want to provide refunds so maybe still more cost effective to fly...unnecessary risk not to mention carbon emissions imho.
I'm not going anywhere near Italy, so am desperately hoping the FCO advice will expand to include Venice in their no travel zone and then I can claim on insurance. It's just so much money to lose otherwise. Depressing all round.

Yes unless:

• FCO advise is not to travel
• Flights get cancelled
• We are ill/quarantined in the UK before travel
• The attractions at our destination are closed so that although we can in theory travel there we won't be able to do any of the things that we planned to do.

We are just at risk of catching the virus here and so far the advise is not to change our daily routine and/or stop doing any of our usual activities (unless symptomatic or travel to high risk areas).

At the moment it's a watch and wait situation. We are hoping to go, but if need be (as per scenarios above) we will cancel.

Still planning on going to Brittany at
Easter

I was meant to be travelling to Europe for work in a couple of weeks and my employers have just restricted all non-essential travel. I’m really glad - the country I was going to doesn’t have many cases but I was worried about the airport and the flight. I wouldn’t be going abroad on holiday, certainly.

@BackInTime, so whose advice are we meant to listen to apart from the government? MN? Someone in asda?

Lol at someone in ASDA 😂

Husband and kids are planning Norfolk to the in laws at Easter (I have to work) and I’m more worried about risk to in laws if disease is circulating fairly widely by then as they self-isolate pretty effectively most of the time apart from the weekly shop at Tesco, and both have underlying health conditions so we’ll need to make that call nearer the time.

@PrettyTricky I think you have your wish based on latest FCO advice (as long as it holds until your trip?)

Cancelled trip to Singapore to visit family

DS skiing trip to France likely to be cancelled

The advice is likely to be not to travel to more destinations as time goes until the spread of the coronavirus is manageable

I travel every week, no intention of stopping (I spend half the week in one place and the rest elsewhere)

We’ve got a big once in a lifetime family holiday planned for Easter and unless FO say we can’t travel or if we are ill then we stand to lose a lot of money so we will go if possible.

I’m worried about any of us getting ill abroad though and needing quarantine. Does anyone know what would happen if you were screened and happened to have a fever caused by something other than cv? Would you just have to wait for results before being allowed to continue your journey?

Unless you can afford to lose money?

Everyone can afford to lose the money they’ve spent on their holiday - the money is already spent, ergo you can afford it, even if it means you miss out on a holiday this year. A more pertinent question is can you afford to pay for an extended stay or health care if you get stuck away from home, and your insurance won’t payout.

I think for most insurance policies, an optional travel disruption extension is needed to cover for CV.
My original policy didn't cover me, not even if FOC advice was not to travel, as it didn't include disease/ pandemic. I advise everyone to read their policies to check what they are actually insured for.
Am booked to go to Japan in April. If I decide not to go, I've lost over 5 grand. I imagine it's a wee bit easier to selflessly bin your holiday if it's not booked or only a deposit has been paid.

I last flew anywhere or left Scotland nealy 4 years ago, so our Japan trip to see relatives isn't quite like missing our usual annual holiday.

I'm not going anywhere near Italy, so am desperately hoping the FCO advice will expand to include Venice in their no travel zone and then I can claim on insurance.

Current FCO travel advice is nothing except essential travel to Northern Italy including Venice, so you should be fine.

I think many tourist sites will be closed within the next few weeks, even if flights aren’t cancelled and places haven’t been placed on lock-down. For example, we are due to go to Poland at Easter but Auschwitz has asked those from countries with confirmed cases to stay away.

I’m mostly being pragmatic. As another poster said, money has already been spent, so it’s not about ‘losing’ money. Ofc we will try and arrange for credit on flights to use elsewhere at a later date (even if we have a few to do do), but I’m more concerned about spreading the virus myself, or being quarantined abroad than I am having a fun holiday.

I’ll hold off making concrete decisions until a week or so out.

*fee not few

@Perihelion - are you sure about your insurance? I thought that if FO advised against travel to a certain country then your insurers would not cover you so you are forced to cancel?

I think/hope we are ok insurance wise but I might ring them to double check. We’ve paid £12,000 for our trip so I agree with you that it’s a lot easier for people not in our position to tell us we can afford to cancel and lose the money/holiday.

Yeah losing thousands of pounds on a holiday is meaningful to me - I worked my ass off to pay for it and have been planning for over a year - throwing that away just because I might get a virus seems extreme when I could get ill in the UK anyway!

Il be taking my chances

My original policy which I spent an afternoon reading covered cancellation due to FOC advice for floods, hurricanes, volcanoes ..all sorts of things, but not disease / pandemic. If it isn't mentioned, it is covered. That's when I changed policy and bought a travel disruption extension, which covers cancellation on Foc/WHO due to pandemic and pays out much, much more if affected when away.

If it isn't mentioned, it ISN'T covered.

I've read my policy and we are covered in case of having to cancel the holiday or in case one of us becomes ill while there. And it has travel disruption included, thankfully. It was taken out as an annual policy last year when we booked and paid for the holiday.

We are still going and will be as vigilant as possible about hand hygeine etc. Which is what we'd have to be doing here as the incident of cases rises here too anyway.

Were meant to be going to Efteling but won't of things continue on their current trajectory. If we end up quarantined, we couldn't expect our employers to have any sympathy. If we became ill I'd want it to be in the UK.

On second thoughts, maybe we'll go to Singapore so that we can take advantage of their superior health care should we need it.

I’m going to Disneyland Paris in Easter. It’s still open and Eurostar won’t give us our money back unless they cancel so we are still going.

We are supposed to go and stay with family in Rome. I am not sure I want to go. Mainly because all schools are closed and so are most cinemas, pools, museums, concerts and so on.

I would be paranoid of catching something and giving it to family.

Also, we have been told by school that anyone going anywhere in Italy over Easter will have to self quarantine for 2 weeks. Sigh.