Direct holidays-am I protected if balance paid by cheque?

martin57

Hi there,

Booked a holiday with direct holidays a few weeks ago and paid deposit of £140 which incurred a 2.5% sur charge on credit card. Balance is to be paid by 19 may and I was thinking of paying the remaining £1300 by cheque to save any further charges. Wonder if I'm covered ok doing it this way, if anyone is familiar with direct holidays.

thanks

martin57

saveapenny

No you wouldnt be covered paying by cheque and Direct Holidays although part of MyTravel are not ABTA bonded. Best to look at the 2.5% charge as insurance.

http://www.directholidays.co.uk/AniteNextPage.asp?p=ABOUT&xml=DISPLAYPAGE%20&s=499328321 If you look at that its a bit misleading but only your flgiht would be covered under MyTravels ATOL

Sam_Bee

saveapenny wrote: »

No you wouldnt be covered paying by cheque and Direct Holidays although part of MyTravel are not ABTA bonded. Best to look at the 2.5% charge as insurance.

http://www.directholidays.co.uk/AniteNextPage.asp?p=ABOUT&xml=DISPLAYPAGE%20&s=499328321 If you look at that its a bit misleading but only your flgiht would be covered under MyTravels ATOL

But it's ATOL that protects them? So if they are ATOL bonded their money is safe if they pay by cheque. If you pay by cc all you are doing is double bonding the same thing, and paying 2.5% for the privilige.

ABTA doesn't really do a lot anymore.

Edit - sorry SAP misread your post a bit:

"If you look at that its a bit misleading but only your flgiht would be covered under MyTravels ATOL"

I'm interested in this for other reasons - i'm looking but can't see where you're alluding to - can you point me in the right direction. Just if the entire package is not covered, they are definitely misrepresenting themselves.

sloppychops

http://www.abta.com/scripts/edge/qsearch.mv

http://www.abta.com/scripts/edge/search2000_number.mv?+W9504

saveapenny

I was under the impression that ABTA kicked them out about 4 years ago (maybe longer) and that now it was only the flights that were covered if they used either Mytravel flights or one of the other ATOL member flight.
It might be worth calling ABTA and checking but like Sam said ABTA 9 times out of 10 isnt worth botherign with unless you go into the high street agencies or use a good indie because getting your money back is a hard uphill struggle and its much easier getting it back from CC company

I have had (unfortunaly) experience of all 3 and by far the easiest and less tressful was booking with an high street agent when Intersun went bust..many years ago.

Worst was booking a cruise with BooknGo when they went bust I had a right game with ABTA till PO decided to take over all the bookings

dzug

You have paid more than £100 by credit card. If you pay the rest by cheque that CC payment provides protection for the whole holiday, not just the deposit.

Sam_Bee

dzug wrote: »

You have paid more than £100 by credit card. If you pay the rest by cheque that CC payment provides protection for the whole holiday, not just the deposit.

Are you 100% certain of that???

See, i've just received my own ATOL, and had to undergo massive scrutiny to get it. But the whole travel protection scheme is full of contradiction, irregularities and confusion.

The sooner the CAA introduce a blanket £1 per person bonding charge irrelevant of flight, flight inclusive, accommodation only, package, diy, dynamically packaged, THE BETTER!!

dzug

99.9% sure - it's under consumer credit legislation. The credit provider is as liable as the service provider if the latter goes bust. Confirmation is probably somewhere on this site if you rummage around - I don't have time at the moment.

It's not protection that would get you another holiday but you would get your money back - eventually.

sloppychops

dzug wrote: »

99.9% sure - it's under consumer credit legislation. The credit provider is as liable as the service provider if the latter goes bust. Confirmation is probably somewhere on this site if you rummage around - I don't have time at the moment.

It's not protection that would get you another holiday but you would get your money back - eventually.

Taken from following website. http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/31/creditcards-31.htm

The claim is not limited to the amount of the credit card transaction. Customers can claim for all losses caused by the breach of contract or misrepresentation. And this applies even if all they paid by credit card was the deposit.

Voyager2002

dzug wrote: »

You have paid more than £100 by credit card. If you pay the rest by cheque that CC payment provides protection for the whole holiday, not just the deposit.

That is how I understand the position, and at one time I telephoned my credit card company to check.

Anyway, I think that the helpful post from Sloppychops makes it clear that you are correct.

Mike_J

I thought ATOL was tour operators and ABTA was Travel Agents. As direct holidays sell only direct holidays, isnt that why they are only ATOL registered