Credit card payments for holidays

joho

Quick q: when you pay by credit card you get certain insurances from the credit card company, but I wanted to know if I get these by paying only the deposit or if I have to pay the entire cost of the holiday?

Thank you. xx

richardw

Apparently the amount has to be £100 or more and some Visa Delta Debit cards give protection, but check with your card issuer first. Also don't forget Travel Insurance for cancellation protection, some exclude airline insolvency.

joho

Thankyou Richard. We paid a £600 deposit so hopefully that's sufficient. I'll get OH to check as he paid it. The hol is with Thomson so hopefully insolvency is unlikely - though you never know!!!!!!!

Diamond_Olly

Did you book direct or with an agent. If you booked through an agent, your money is protected through them. The holiday is also protected through ATOL so money protected through them as well.

richardw

But don't the credit card people pay out quicker than ABTA/ATOL when things go wrong.

joho

Thanks Olly. We thought we had booked with Thomson themselves, as we were on their website, but then all correspondence is coming through Lincoln Travel. The first confirmation came on paper headed with late deals and ski deals and lots of other deals, and I panicked. But others confirmed at the time that these were all part of Thomson.

rbulph

Your original question is of interest to me. I'm thinking of booking a holiday with a company which is not ATOL/ABTA bonded and they require me to pay 2% extra if I use a credit card. If paying the deposit by credit card is enough to get me Consumer Credit Act protection then I'll do that, and pay the balance by cheque.

I think that the answer to your question is yes, you do get the protection if you only pay the deposit by credit card:

s. 75(1) of the Act: "If the debtor under a debtor-creditor-supplier agreement falling within section 12(b) or (c) has, in relation to a transaction financed by the agreement, any claim against the supplier in respect of a misrepresentation or breach of contract, he shall have a like claim against the creditor, who, with the supplier, shall accordingly be jointly and severally liable to the debtor. "

and s. 189: "“finance” means to finance wholly or partly and “financed” and “refinanced” shall be construed accordingly; "

So if you pay the deposit by credit card, you have financed the holiday with it. If you then pay the full amount and the tour company goes bust, you naturally have a claim for the full cost of the holiday against the tour company. And you have a like claim against the credit card company.

Would be interested to know if anyone has any other thoughts on this.

richardw

rbulph wrote: »

I'm thinking of booking a holiday with a company which is not ATOL/ABTA bonded

Perhaps google them and see if others have had any problems with them, also check your insurance to see if there are any exlusions with regard to non bonded holiday companies.

rbulph

Can't find much commentary online, either good or bad. But they run lots of very interesting looking trips - http://www.adventurex.co.uk/default.asp. My insurance won't cover me if a travel company goes bust, bonded or not. I have no particular reason to think that this company does represent any particular risk - I'm just very cautious when parting with my money.

Sam_Bee

rbulph wrote: »

Can't find much commentary online, either good or bad. But they run lots of very interesting looking trips - http://www.adventurex.co.uk/default.asp. My insurance won't cover me if a travel company goes bust, bonded or not. I have no particular reason to think that this company does represent any particular risk - I'm just very cautious when parting with my money.

They don't sell flights, so don't need bonding.

Trips do look pretty amazing though.