Flexible booking

We know it’s daunting trying to second-guess which destinations are going to be possible over the next six months or so.  Not only are we on hand to take away much of the guesswork by applying our industry know-how and tools such as ECDC data, NHS guidance and local contacts to help pick the safest bets, but we’ve also come up with a portfolio of totally flexible holidays that you can cancel or change without penalty right up to your balance due date.  These flexible destinations are available to book with deposits from £50 per person,  and if you decide you don’t want to go for any reason, you can simply cancel and we’ll give you 18 months to use the deposit for something else.   This means you can plan ahead and grab those early booking discounts, then change your mind without any penalty at all.

For our group tours we’re offering to hold places without any deposit at all, until the tour fills. Once we’re operating a waitlist and your place is in demand, we’ll contact you to ask you if you’d like to confirm with a deposit or let the place go. You’re in control. And rest assured,  if the tour has to be cancelled due to a FCDO travel advisory or border closure, you’ll always be offered your money back in cash if you prefer not to postpone or book something else. Should you take this option you’ll be repaid within 14 days.

Financial Security

With our low overheads we’ve always been able to offer fantastic value, but what this means right now is that we are unburdened by many of the existential threats facing our larger rivals who rent retail space, and we’ll see this crisis through.  We’ve never used customer deposits as operating capital, it is ring-fenced and left untouched in our accounts, so we have the reserves to pay back every single client tomorrow should we need to.  Not many companies can promise that.

You don’t have to take our word for it through, we also offer full financial protection for insolvency through our ATOL and ABTOT bonds so you can book knowing every penny you spend on a holiday with us is safe.

In fact, you’re not taking a risk at all when you book with us. The vast majority of our bookings are packages, which means they are protected by the Package Travel Regulations. These state that if your holiday has to be cancelled by us due to FCDO advice or border closures, you are legally entitled to a full refund, in cash, within 14 days.  We’d love it if you chose to postpone instead but if you need to cancel it doesn’t matter if the airline or the hotel won’t refund us, we will still refund you – we take the financial hit, not our clients.

It’s for this reason that a few well-publicised large travel firms are breaking the law and refusing to refund in cash or delaying refunds for months. Some are offering refunds but are so difficult to get hold of that you can’t actually speak to anyone to get any advice or ask for your refund in the first place.    By contrast, we have been available immediately to discuss bookings with clients by email, phone or in person from Day 1 of this crisis.  When clients have chosen to cancel we have refunded them in cash within 14 days without a quibble.

It’s for this reason that booking with a personal, independent specialist like has always the safest financial option, but never more so than now.

We’re here for you, at home or abroad

We’re an independent agency staffed by a dedicated small team of experts – we don’t have a call centre, we never read from script, and you’ll never be referred to our website for advice.  You’ll always get straight through to us if you call, to speak to someone with years of experience in the travel industry who knows all about your booking and how to think outside the box to help you solve your travel problems.  Worried that travel advice may change? Call us for a chat to discuss it. Wedding postponed (again)? We’ll sort out moving your honeymoon for you right away, and we’ll keep doing it as many times as you need.

We’ve got you covered while you’re away too. In all of our mid and long-haul destinations we work with a local partner agency who can be contacted 24 hours a day in the same time-zone and who will be your invaluable local advisor if anything happens while you’re abroad.  We also operate a 24 hour emergency line here in the UK for nearer countries that don’t usually required a dedicated in-country team.

This means that immediate assistance is only a phone call away no matter where you are, and what time of day it is.    If anything happens to disrupt your trip while you’re there, either our team or our local partners swoop into action to act as your interpreter and advocate, re-arrange all your hotel and transfer reservations,  arrange transport and treatment at a reputable hospital if needed, and liaise with your airline to change dates or get you home immediately if need be.  Sometimes we’re even able to take pro-active measures so that by the time you realise you need help everything has already been taken care of.

We’re great in a crisis

Before the pandemic you may never have thought so much assistance was necessary, as most holidays are of course trouble-free! However, we’ve always operated in far-flung locations and have always known that things don’t always run as smoothly as they might do at home. Over the years have helped our clients through all kinds of unexpected disruption, from strikes, coups, guerrillas, terrorists and civil wars, to hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, floods, earthquakes and tsunamis and of course a fair few health emergencies too in both exotic and more familiar locations.

All our previous experience dealing with various types of emergencies over the years means we’re great in a travel crisis! Although this pandemic is the biggest one yet, we weren’t caught on the hop and had the tools to stay calm and steady throughout, offering quick and tailored emergency help from Day 1.

We’ve offered advice to help navigate new travel laws and procedures, we’ve changed dates and destinations (often several times!), we’ve repatriated clients stranded abroad, persuaded hotels not to charge extra even when new bookings are in peak season,  retained honeymoon perks even when the wedding has been postponed till after the honeymoon (!) and even to helped clients claim back money from airlines and other suppliers that they have booked direct, even though we didn’t make the booking.   More than anything we have been a friendly ear that our clients know they can call any time they might be worried.

Whilst some well-known agencies have lost the trust of their clients over the course of the Coronavirus pandemic, as a result of our approach we’re proud to say our clients have come to value us more than ever.   So many of the trips we book are not just ‘holidays’ ,  they are honeymoons, anniversary trips, milestone birthday celebrations or family reunions and there’s a lot more than just money tied up in the booking. We recognise that and have treated each client as though they were a friend – many have actually become our genuine friends as a result.