Travel tests- reviews

[Aroundtheworldin80moves]

We have just returned from holiday.

We used...
Randox LFTs for return pre departures... got certificates through in under a minute of submitting scan. However App was complex to download.
Randox 2 day PCRs... did yesterday afternoon. Again the registering system was a pain. However we dropped them in the box at 4pm yesterday, results by 8am this morning.

Chromatics Day 2 PCRs... registering more straightforward. Used the Royal Mail return envelopes (as we couldn't get near a drop box). Posted yesterday at 2pm. Will update when we recieve results.

@TheTeenageYears Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but they were listed on gov.co in the list of approved suppliers so how was I to know? Still no results, home 9 days now, do you suggest I continue to self isolate for the rest of my life if I never hear back from them??

[quote wannabebetterwatchout]@TheTeenageYears Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but they were listed on gov.co in the list of approved suppliers so how was I to know? Still no results, home 9 days now, do you suggest I continue to self isolate for the rest of my life if I never hear back from them??[/quote]
I looked into this when the kids ones took ages. It was 14 days for England. Which, considering that you can test positive and be released after 7 days is outrageous really!

We've all got 3x lateral flow negatives, and mum (who was away with us) has had her negative PCR result (used different company as lives elsewhere) so I'm not going to self isolate any longer... I'll risk any legal action and am 100% sure I'm not a threat to anyone.

I've used Chronomics several times without a problem but DH returned to the UK on Tuesday. No day 2 PCR waiting for him although DPD had apparently delivered it on 31st December while we were away, sending 'proof' as a photo of the exterior door to our apartment block. Chronomics hopefully getting more delivered tomorrow and fortunately DH works from home.

We have twice used the on site testing at Leeds Bradford Airport (NPH) for pre-departure LFTs. Test certificate received within minutes both times.

[quote wannabebetterwatchout]@TheTeenageYears Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but they were listed on gov.co in the list of approved suppliers so how was I to know? Still no results, home 9 days now, do you suggest I continue to self isolate for the rest of my life if I never hear back from them??[/quote]
Unfortunately the government list is awash with crap companies but like buying any product or service online there is the opportunity to Google them. I live abroad so testing companies, types of test, speed of results, changes to testing requirements across a number of countries has become my specialist area of interest over the last 2 years. From the 12 companies first listed on the government list as offering day 5 test to release in Dec 2020 to which companies can provide same day results on a day 2 arrival PCR for not an extortionate figure in Dec 21 - it's all swooshing around my head in a sea of other hopefully soon to be redundant covid information!

Update - dh's negative result finally came yesterday (only 14 days after we came home) still no sign of mine....

We have had a horrible time with Collinson and are waiting on a refund. It's been two months (which reminds me I need to follow up). Their system didn't work to change test times, and, after we booked they could not guarantee that we would have the results within the time frame we had paid for them to be done in.

In the end we went with Dam Health, and have used them a handful of times now (travelling for work as well) and they have been fantastic.

We used eurofins with a BA discount code.

We did a supervised LFT before departure, did it in a local travel agent. They really didn’t supervise at all but the results and certificate were with us within an hour by email.

Did a day 2 PCR at a sampling site, same travel agents. We did them at 3pm yesterday and got the results at 4am this morning so 13 hours later which I thought was pretty impressive.

We could have converted the PCRs to LFTs and got a small discount (as booked before rules changed) but we decided just to stick with the PCRs.