Room sharing on group holidays

[mauvish]

I am trying to formulate a letter to a large holiday company about the policy of allocating roomshare partners on adventure holidays.

The background - I always pay the single supplement on such holidays but sometimes the company warns that a single room might not be available for every night in some locations, especially when off the beaten track (as such holidays often are - think tents, homestays, small boats, sleeper trains etc). I've no issue with sharing with another woman in such circumstances but, you've guessed it, on my latest such trip one of the "single women" was a trans woman, and I was worrying myself sick about having to share a room. In the end that wasn't necessary but I want to know how the company would deal with such a situation - or better still, avoid putting any of their customers in such a situation.

I'm trying to use factual, professional language which leaves no doubt as to my concerns without getting "shrill". I want them to think about how they will deal with this problem in the future so that they can reassure single women that they will only ever have to share with other WOMEN as opposed to trans women. It's not easy! And of course I don't know who will read my letter, how aware they are of gender and trans issues, and where their sympathies will lie.

The following seems clumsy but it's my best shot so far. Naturally the full letter is longer than this, with preceding explanatory paras. Can anyone improve this for me? Maybe I should leave off the phrase after "their sex"?

I am seeking reassurance that no customer on any future trip would be obliged to unwillingly roomshare with another customer whose gender self-identification is at odds with their sex as identified at birth and as evident to third parties.

I'm also suggesting in my letter that the company rewrite their booking conditions which currently state that they will always pair people according to gender - this needs to be "according to sex", does it not?

Many thanks for any useful input here.

If they're a British company, is there something in the Trades Descriptions Act? Goods as described or similar?

I think you might have to walk them through why it's important for women to not have to share with males. Safety, privacy and dignity.

I think they probably already appreciate that, as per their outdated comment about sharing based on gender. I don't however want my letter to turn into a sex vs gender essay. I thought about raising the issue of duty of care, but I think I will hold back on that sort of comment and only use it if I'm unhappy with the initial response from them.

If it’s Intrepid (I saw similar terms when I booked with them), I wouldn’t hold much hope. They’re an Australian company, and Aus is pretty captured, and it’s in their terms and conditions that they go on passport gender.

I have come across this on yoga retreats and Buddhist retreats.

When discussing rooms I wasn't asked if I was M/F, I was asked which gender I identify as.

I specified that I would prefer to only share with biological females, or would alternatively be happy to pay the extra supplement for a single room.

I think I’d appeal to the part closest to their hearts.

££££

ask if their insurers are aware of this policy ?

ask how they and their insurers plan to deal with the risks of legal action / reputational risk to the company given the convictions/ prison population for violent and sexually motivated crime relative to the population levels is orders of magnitude different for women versus …. (Insert MN censor approved term in here)

then it is cold hard cash vs hurtyfeels

It's not Intrepid.

I rang the customer service number to ask to whom I should address my query and in fact I had a very positive response - the person said they completely understood my concerns and yes, it was something that the company needed to discuss and plan for.

Of course it's unlikely that the person who answered the phone will have any input into company policy but I felt that there was at least 1 person in the office who understood!

I think you have to start with a short explainer of the difference between sex and gender, and then say that some people have a valid need to only share with someone of the same sex.

e.g.

Dear Company,

I'm writing to ask about your policy on room sharing on adventure holidays. At the moment, I think you ask for holidaymaker's gender and then allocate rooms sharing by gender. However, I'm sure you are aware that there is increasing recognition that sex and gender are not the same thing. Sex is the physical characteristics of the body determined by DNA and cannot be changed. Gender is how a person identifies , including masculine, feminine and nonbinary.

For people who are transgender, they identify in a way that does not match their physical sex, so for example a transwoman is someone who was born a male might identify as a woman and select the 'female roomshare' option when booking a holiday. This could cause a problem if roomshares end up having two people of the same gender who differ in physical sex, for example a women sharing with a transwoman. This could make both parties uncomfortable, and there could be several reasons why the woman would feel unable to share with a person of a different sex.

what is your policy to avoid this problem?

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Good luck, it would be such a waste of money if they weren't forthcoming.

There's a travel company that I lost interest in, I think either intrepid or trail finders, or maybe the Culture Trip. They made it pretty clear that they go by identity rather than biology when putting two unknown "women" together.

It's a shame because I have no issue personally with a woman identifying as a man and taking hormones etc, a man I know, anyone acros the sexuality spectrum or even a post op man (appreciate lots of others wouldn't be). I literally just don't want a strange penis person, but this is too much to ask 😒