Whats the benefit of booking holidays with a credit card?

shell820810

Just wondering whether to pay an extra 2.5% to pay by credit card, or just use a visa debit card.

dzug1

If the holiday company fails to meet its contractual obligations or goes bust, you have a right to claim against the credit card company.

Note 'contractual obligations' - that doesn't cover every conceivable circumstance. It's not a substitute for insurance.

Something very similar applies in the case of visa (but no other) debit cards - so the advantages in your case are not so clear cut.

Babycakes

dzug1 wrote: »

If the holiday company fails to meet its contractual obligations or goes bust, you have a right to claim against the credit card company.

Note 'contractual obligations' - that doesn't cover every conceivable circumstance. It's not a substitute for insurance.

Something very similar applies in the case of visa (but no other) debit cards - so the advantages in your case are not so clear cut.

I bought a holiday with my mastercard and Onthebeach.co.uk. The credit card did not provide any protection when Onthebeach cancelled my holiday. The answer is not a lot of protection is provided by your credit card. You are better off saving the credit card surcharge and using it towards buying travel insurance.

Caz3121

in a case like the ash where you do not have a package holiday, the accomodation offered is still there and no breach of contract has taken place however you may not be able to get there...in these circumstances there is no comeback from the cc company

ferf1223

Babycakes wrote: »

I bought a holiday with my mastercard and Onthebeach.co.uk. The credit card did not provide any protection when Onthebeach cancelled my holiday.

I'm not sure the specifics of your situation as to why On the Beach cancelled your holiday...but in our case, when our airline (MaxJet) went bust, we had a chargeback/refund on our credit card within 10 days by going through the credit card company. As the flights cost a fair amount of money it was a huge relief to us to have it sorted out pretty much straight away. As we received word that MaxJet was in administration on Christmas Day, I reckon we would have had the refund faster had it not been over the holidays.

So I would say that, at least from our experience, booking on a cc is worth it...of course ultimately you hope to never have to make any sort of a claim from the cc company but when we did, it was very simple.

moonrakerz

dzug1 wrote: »

If the holiday company fails to meet its contractual obligations or goes bust, you have a right to claim against the credit card company.

Note 'contractual obligations' - that doesn't cover every conceivable circumstance. It's not a substitute for insurance.

Something very similar applies in the case of visa (but no other) debit cards - so the advantages in your case are not so clear cut.

Paying for a holiday on a CC and getting cover under sect 75 can be a little complicated, see:- http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/31/creditcards-31.htm

Also the "protection" offered by Visa debit cards is NOT a legal requirement, so VISA, if they wished, could stop it overnight.

The really important thing to remember with a Credit Card is: if anything goes wrong - it isn't your money ! with a Debit Card , it is !

davidlizard

A happy compromise is to pay a bit of it (e.g. the deposit) on the credit card, with the rest of it paid some other way (cash, debit card - i.e. anything that does not attract the surcharge).

In that way, you get the Section 75 protection on the FULL amount but only pay the 2.5% credit card surcharge on the bit you actually paid on the credit card.

See http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/section75-protect-your-purchases section about halfway down "What if I only pay the deposit on the credit card?", but also note the bits in "Are there any exceptions?" in the same article.