spouse of scouse

It would have been a sad realisation for your mum Scamp, but she's made a very sensible decision. She's only a couple of years older than me and we cancelled our UK/Europe/Asia trip a couple of days ago.

We've had some success with getting refunds for flights and accommodation, with refunds for some still up in the air. We have good travel insurance but haven't made any claims on it yet because our cancellation is termed 'change of mind'. In case it might help someone else with a multi-country trip planned, this is how I'm tackling it:

Flights.
Turkish Airlines Perth - Manchester. Manchester - Istanbul - Kuala Lumpur - Perth. Airline is refunding $8,700 out of $10,570 - the shortfall is explained as cancellation fees plus non-refundable taxes.

Easyjet - Liverpool - Sicily - Liverpool. Totally non-refundable flights, unless Easyjet themselves cancel. So I'm leaving those and crossing my fingers.
Easyjet - Liverpool - Madrid - Liverpool. Same as above.

Accommodation
Liverpool - Airbnb conditions allowed for cancellation, they provided an immediate refund and waived their service fees (they weren't obliged to do that)
Liverpool - Hotel tariff allowed for cancellations at no charge
Sicily - Hotel tariff was non-refundable but they were very kind and removed the charge on my credit card, ie full refund
Spain - Hotel tariff allowed for cancellations at no charge
Istanbul - Hotel tariff is non-refundable so unless the hotel itself cancels that's around $4,500 gone. Unless the Oz government issues a 'do not travel' advisory for Turkey, or Turkey closes its borders, in which case I can claim from my travel insurance
Kuala Lumpur - Hotel tariff allowed for cancellation at no charge

Miscellaneous
Chauffeur transfers Istanbul airport - hotel - airport, non-refundable
Visa fees for Turkey, non-refundable

So all in all a better result than I expected. Best of luck to your Mum and you with refunds.

scrubbedexpat141

How have you got these refunds? By ringing and asking nicely?
I just spoke to Sister and she's going to ring Turkish, but told her if they won't offer money back for cancelling then just move to a later date rather than surrender the cash.
They've got the same as you for the Istanbul hotel, need FCO to warn against travel to claim on insurance.
You've provided other travellers a good tip to always book refundable when possible and not hugely more expensive.

THanks for sharing.
I'm going to get them both on it tonight / tomorrow.
Mother's is more complex with the flights.

co durham boy

Lasted 3 hrs here , you can have a drink if you sit down in my local . 'No standing at the bar' , it's a bit like the lounge area in a working mans club in the 80's !!!!

spouse of scouse

I couldn't deal directly with Turkish airlines as I'd booked through a third party (webjet au) so had to go through them. Impossible to get them on the phone and in any case I wanted a written record of our conversation, so private messaged them through their Facebook page. Was quite surprised to get a reply within 24 hours. They did the work with the airline and advised of the refund that applied to our booking. Haven't received the final confirmation from them yet so sweating on that a bit!

For the accommodation that had T&Cs which allowed cancellations, I just did that online. For the ones that didn't I emailed the hotels direct and was super nice

Yes, your mum's is much more complex. Good call to advise her to rebook if she can't get a refund. Hopefully they'd allow the new booking to be several months from now. Might be worth her checking if it's a 'one time only' rebooking, ie if she rebooks and then needs to cancel again then there's no further recourse. Mind you, she doesn't really have any alternative of she can't get a refund I guess. The whole thing's just crap.

scrubbedexpat141

Just found out she's done it through a travel agent, so going to get them on the case for her. Much easier (I hope).

Sister will lose 150 quid of 550 for cancelling her flight, have told her I'll transfer it today if she cancels.

Now putting pressure on the retreat to issue something saying they'll get refunds if quarantine becomes an issue on arrival in Thailand.

For you

DXBtoDOH

Not like any of the EU countries are doing any better. The lockdowns only started in Germany and Poland and Denmark two days ago as well.

Standanista

At Midnight Wednesday night, DOH shuts to non-Qatari arrivals, so a scramble to get on flights back. Just paid over a grand return to get back in from UK. LGW flights cut from 3 to 2 a day from tomorrow. Bars/restaurants/public transport shut, at least there's Ramadan to look forward to.

DXBtoDOH

Thank G-d I'm out of that hellhole.

My parents are cloistered in their village but I just had frank discussion with my mother about why they cannot have dinner with friends tonight, even at their houses instead of a restaurant. That they must stay home with films and books and the garden and dogs and not go anywhere for at least six weeks. I don't care how healthy they are, that they have no chronic issues, that she's a retired doctor blah blah blah. I think they're getting the point more seriously today than just a few days ago.

Millhouse

I've decided to let the maid work from home tomorrow. Can't be too careful.

Standanista

Good advice for sure. Hope they're okay.

We obviously have different perspectives on Doha, as discussed previously. Fair enough really. I like its sense of community. There's the blockade to thank to an extent, a spirit of Keep Calm & Carry On. Coronavirus is just an extension of that really; I would think that most expats still there will take it in our stride, no worries.

Anyway, Doha is moving towards a bit of a lockdown. Restaurants, public transport and taxis shut. No non-Qatari arrivals allowed after Wednesday night for at least 2 weeks.

scrubbedexpat141

Father is listening to this advice now, having been kicking off at my Sister. He's ordered an extra freezer and a big food delivery, reckons he can hide out for a month on that alone. Sky, netflix, internet - he could probably hide out indefinitely.

Old people need to be told and reminded it seems.

Millhouse

If they hunker down for a month, won't they just catch it later from all the walking zombies? genuine question, my mum is very high-risk.

I still don't see how this ends... what we really need is some proper misinformation to make us think everything is ok and we just carry on with life. I'm really starting to think that transparency isn't that helpful. If we don't test, for most people who catch it they will think it's a bad cold/flu... the oldies will die and it'll be chalked up as pneumonia ... just as how everyone basically dies in the end anyway.

Millhouse

Had to laugh at the video of Idris released on twitter/news... yeh, tested positive, it sucks etc... while being completely fine, with his wife sitting behind him.

Finally, I have someone in my network who caught it... 3 days of flu/shivers/stiffness, 11 days of total and utter boredom in quarantine waiting to go home.

BEVS

Old people? You cheeky monkey.

Stick your earhole between my thumb and forefinger right now whilst I give it a good tweak. Your Mum is only 62 if I recall . I am not old . I am ............ mature ......if a little wrinkly around the edges

I have a moment over the retreat thing. You contact them direct and chat to them about their sensible and responsible postpone/cancel policies as though it is a given. Get a rebook for one year time or something like that. Yes. I get that you may have already done this but just in case you didn't go that route.

It doesn't need writing I know but all age groups need to understand exactly what this is. What it is not is some video on line game or a disaster film. It's here. It's real. It's now. What you do for yourself impacts on more than you.

scrubbedexpat141

Well, I don't know really mate. I'm guessing if it keeps getting worse he just stays in. He's 69 and fat but has huge lungs (he's a big guy) and has never smoked. Strong but has a couple of the potential issues to make you higher risk. I just want him to stay in for a while and see what happens, he typically holidays a lot so that's been banned by us and he seems to be taking it very seriously. In a month, maybe he resets and goes again or tops up throughout the period. He's got a nice terrace so can get fresh air and space.

You can test here in Dubai but it costs 122 dizzers or something, up until yesterday you needed about 8 documents as well.

Yeah, I expect that's what most will get - but you have a responsibility as a human being to not go out and be a dick when you know you got the germ. Technically, it's gotta be manslaughter....or something, right?

Old people are among my favourite types of people, really great, love them. Apart from nasty ones.

She's hanging fire on the retreat because it's been booked through a yoga lead who is also making money out of it. She keeps emailing like they're all still going. So she doesn't want to cancel and have to offer any refunds, nor will the accommodation retreat place. It's a shame but what'll end up happening is the people who've paid to go will be the ones left with nothing, the retreat make money for nothing and the insurers won't pay out unless FCO say don't go.

I think waiting until someone flinches is a good tactic here. First to say it's off loses.