Who do you book your hols with?

[1million]

OK so all the larger tour op's are very pricy at the mo - so who do you book with?

For Europe we normally book directly with the hotel and book flights with the airline. I found this a lot easier and I get better flight times and can choose exactly what rooms I want.

When I look at the tour operator websites I never find the room combination I want to book or it is very expensive compared to direct booking.

We only used tour operators for a guided tour in Thailand and Virgin as we part-used Virgin miles to pay for it.

We book flights with easyjet from our local airport and hotels/apartments with Travel Republic as they seem to be the cheapest site. We also book transfers independently too

Another independent booker steer clear of tour operators and tour operator destinations. Also avoid travel agents like the plague.

Book everything independently -
research hotels on trip advisor and use booking.com to book - normally free cancellation and payment at the hotel
use flip key (part of the trip advisor website) to rent a house or villa
book flights directly with the airline - cathay pacific e.g. lets you hold the flight for 24 hours (no fee) so it's easy to see if you can get a better deal before you pay.

I really CBA with all the faffing around to book everything independently so I am prepared to pay more and go through a tour operator. Our last few holidays have been with Transun, Virgin and Jet2 and have been fabulous.

As someone who works in travel I would say the cheapest way to book a holiday is to do it independently and sort yourself (99%). However some people like the security of booking a package or with a tour operator, don't have the time to look themselves or don't have the want or knowledge to do the work. If you want a simple hotel and flight holiday then for most people this is easy to book but if you want something more complicated like a 3 week road trip to Canada etc then this might be better booking through an expert. I usually suggest to book through a small specialist company for this type of holiday and not one of the larger well known tour operators as I find the larger companies don't have as much first hand knowledge which I think makes a big difference when paying for the service. When booking hotels I often use booking.com or hotels own web sites, just make sure you check the cancellation policies for all.

We only ever book flights on the airline's own website and rent a house or a flat on Airbnb. For us, this has always been an excellent and simple way to travel for both shorthaul and longhaul holidays.

Guy called Gavin at eshores. He is amazing. Gets prices down as far as possible for us. He's stepped in and sorted things when flights were cancelled and sorted no end of shit out over past few years.

Another independent booker here.

I have booked through Thomas Cook in the recent past and they were dreadful, definitely not worth the extra we paid. I've booked a few last minute deals through teletext holidays as they've been cheaper than doing it myself (as they book waaaay in advance sometimes) and as long as you don't expect anything but your flight tickets and hotel reservation then they are fine.

Just booked Cyprus today for next month and saved £500 by booking the hotel direct and flights on line .

I used to use Booking.com but realised it was more expensive than booking direct, so now I book straight through the hotel.

Fleetway Travel! Fabulous holidays and great prices! I usually book the special offers though!

It doesn't take that much faffing.
Pick your resort/ hotel
Go to trip advisor and check out hotels
Go to google and see who flies where
Ring hotel, check they have availability
Book flight
Ring hotel and tell them you've booked flight

Well that's what I did today.
Rather have £500 in my pocket.

I think travel agents will vanish off the nights greet in 5 - years.
I think the big companies want it that way.

High street ffs

Jaim ..I've noticed that.

We do it ourselves too - flights and then somewhere like ownersdirect.

I normally use Jet2, their prices are very good, but used Thomson this year, it was a bit more but the flight times were better and we got free Select a Seat and private taxi transfer. I like knowing it is all protected if anything went wrong. would rather pay a bit more for peace of mind.

DH and I were saying the other week that we think travel agents will disappear from the high street soon. We book direct, I go trip advisor to check out accommodation, see who will give me the cheapest deal and compare with booking direct. I like the ability to cancel or amend plans with booking.com. We use sky scanner to book flights if flying.

I like the process of booking a holiday.

I have used an agent in the past to book a cruise as they managed to do it cheaper than me.

Expedia, probably not the cheapest but atol covered, and we get transfers and insurance at the same time

We usually book all the separate elements. Flight first then hotel/apartment with booking.com or Sunshine. Have got some great bargains from Sunshine in the past, even for July and August.

We've done a couple of packages in the past and they were really good deals as we were going at out of peak holiday season.

After the volcano issue and whilst we have DD with us we will only book with Thomson/TC/FC as a package deal.

Sis booked her hols with Thomson. Volcano erupts and flights are grounded for an extra 10 days. Her family was fine - Could stay in their AI hotel until new flights and even got discounted laundry.

People that had booked separately had to move out - their flights home were covered as their originals were cancelled, but they had to fork out for new accommodation.

DH and I agreed that whilst we'd 'rough it' in that situation (and sleep on the beach if we had to!) we wouldn't expect that of DD.

Still, only another 10 years or so to go...

Always book everything direct, I'll shop around different sites or contact airlines/hotels direct. Self catering we use homeaway, holidaylettings etc Been doing that since the 90s when we used to get villas from the classifieds in The Lady

Would add for me it's part of the fun of my holiday to see what I can come up with

Depends.
For Europe I will do everything independently.
We recently went as a family to Thailand and Trailfinders were fantastic.
I will certainly use them again.

Independently. I find where we want to go and check prices on sky scanner, then book accommodation through holiday lettings as we normally do cottages/gites/villas rather than hotels. It's not really a faff, I love organising the holidays.