Is a holiday booked with on the beach a package holiday?

krynkly

We have a holiday booked through onthebeach to go to Lanzarote at the end of September 2020. The final payment is due on the 14th September. Despite the FCO guidance onthebeach have said there is no option to postpone the holiday as hotel availability in 2021 is limited and expensive. We therefore have only two options, to pay for the holiday on 14th September and go with invalid insurance OR pay another £100 for the privilege of cancelling resulting in a loss to us of £500. An added complication is that the flights are with Ryanair who are still operating flights to Lanzarote. If this is a package holiday, surely we are entitled to a refund given current FCO advice? 

macman

Refer to your ATOL certificate, that will tell you if it is a package or not. But, if all under the same booking ref incl. the flights, then it probably is.
But no, you are not entitled to any refund, as both the accom and flights are available, and you are free to travel, subject to quarantine upon your return. FCO advice is just that-advisory.
Your best bet is to sit tight and hope that Ryanair cancel the flights. If they do, and it is a package, then you can claim a full refund from OTB.

bagand96

You have a package holiday and have rights under the Package and Linked Travel Regulations 2018.  However, that doesn't mean you have an automatic right to cancel.  There is some protections under the Regs, but it's not clear cut.  here's what MSE says:

Package holiday not cancelled when there's an FCO warning in place? You SHOULD still get a refund from the operator

With package holidays, if a Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) warning is put in place (as has now happened in Spain and France) under the Package Travel Regulations you SHOULD be able to get a refund within 14 days – even if the trip's not been cancelled.

The rules state if "unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances" occur which "significantly affect the performance of the package", you're due a full refund if YOU cancel. And while they don't specifically state that an FCO warning would count as one of these circumstances – though they do give as an example "the outbreak of a serious disease at the travel destination" – in practice travel trade body ABTA says firms MUST refund you if the FCO warns against travel and you can't be given a holiday without "significant change".

So you should be able to get a full refund, but always check first with the firm before you cancel.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2020/02/coronavirus-travel-help-and-your-rights/#restrictions

Even MSE only say should.  It's the interpretation of "Unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances that significantly affect the performance of the package".  Some people think this means the agents should let you cancel for a full refund.  The agents think otherwise, mainly because they stand to loose £££ - Ryanair won't refund them so they'd have to take the loss.

There's been no official guidance or interpretation of that particular wording in the regulations.  To get one it's likely someone in your situation will have to take one of the agents to court

sheramber

Do you have travel insurance that covers  you  for FCO advice against non essential travel.

eskbanker

I agree with bagand96's views on the lack of citable, reliable and rigorous logic in the quoted MSE comments, which fail to make a clear case that adverse FCO advice actually constitutes a significant effect on the performance of a package.  They refer to an ABTA steer that significant changes trigger refund rights, but that's already a given under the PTRs, albeit in the context of actual changes to the delivered package, so it remains far from clear that generic country-level advice actually triggers refund rights.

However, ABTA have at least now clarified their position via https://www.abta.com/news/abta-board-confirms-refund-obligation

ABTA Board confirms refund obligation

Following recent representations made to ABTA concerning package holiday customers’ refund entitlement in the event of Foreign Office advice against all but essential travel to a destination, the ABTA Board has met and confirmed that customers should be offered a full refund in such circumstances. In accordance with the Articles of the Association, the Board agreed unanimously that ABTA Members should offer refunds to their package holiday customers where the Foreign Office advises against travel at the time the customer is due to travel.

At the time of posting, On the Beach is an ABTA member, according to https://www.onthebeach.co.uk/

On the Beach is also a member of ABTA which means you have the benefit of ABTA’s assistance and Code of Conduct.

Therefore, since customers of their members have the right to escalate disputes to ABTA for adjudication, it should be feasible to effectively insist on a refund if an agent is in breach of ABTA's guidance....

mjm3346

FCO is advising against all but essential travel to mainland Spain – this does not cover the Canary Islands or the Balearic Islands because travel advice is based on the risk to the individual traveller and COVID-19 infection rates are lower there than mainland Spain.

Butts

macman said:

Refer to your ATOL certificate, that will tell you if it is a package or not. But, if all under the same booking ref incl. the flights, then it probably is.
But no, you are not entitled to any refund, as both the accom and flights are available, and you are free to travel, subject to quarantine upon your return. FCO advice is just that-advisory.
Your best bet is to sit tight and hope that Ryanair cancel the flights. If they do, and it is a package, then you can claim a full refund from OTB.

So you disagree with the Package and Linked Travel Regulations 2018 and the Recent ABTA statement both of which say exactly the opposite ?

bagand96

Butts said:

macman said:

Refer to your ATOL certificate, that will tell you if it is a package or not. But, if all under the same booking ref incl. the flights, then it probably is.
But no, you are not entitled to any refund, as both the accom and flights are available, and you are free to travel, subject to quarantine upon your return. FCO advice is just that-advisory.
Your best bet is to sit tight and hope that Ryanair cancel the flights. If they do, and it is a package, then you can claim a full refund from OTB.

So you disagree with the Package and Linked Travel Regulations 2018 and the Recent ABTA statement both of which say exactly the opposite ?

Again, the PALTR 2018 don't definitely give the right to a refund because of FCO advice. It is all based around the interpretation of the wording about extraordinary circumstances affecting the performance of the package. 

- MSE say you "should" get a refund but don't go as far as saying it's your absolute right.
- Which? interpret it as you should get a refund  (not unexpected as they're a consumer organisation)
- ABTA have eventually said that their members should refund in the circumstances. Helpful if you're with an ABTA agent. 

But, even with all the above, it is still not black and white. Theres plenty of ammo to throw at an agent now, but it won't be clear cut until there's a legal test case. Given the hundreds of thousands of people affected maybe at least one person will take an agent to court. 

Butts

bagand96 said:

Butts said:

macman said:

Refer to your ATOL certificate, that will tell you if it is a package or not. But, if all under the same booking ref incl. the flights, then it probably is.
But no, you are not entitled to any refund, as both the accom and flights are available, and you are free to travel, subject to quarantine upon your return. FCO advice is just that-advisory.
Your best bet is to sit tight and hope that Ryanair cancel the flights. If they do, and it is a package, then you can claim a full refund from OTB.

So you disagree with the Package and Linked Travel Regulations 2018 and the Recent ABTA statement both of which say exactly the opposite ?

Again, the PALTR 2018 don't definitely give the right to a refund because of FCO advice. It is all based around the interpretation of the wording about extraordinary circumstances affecting the performance of the package. 

- MSE say you "should" get a refund but don't go as far as saying it's your absolute right.
- Which? interpret it as you should get a refund  (not unexpected as they're a consumer organisation)
- ABTA have eventually said that their members should refund in the circumstances. Helpful if you're with an ABTA agent. 

But, even with all the above, it is still not black and white. Theres plenty of ammo to throw at an agent now, but it won't be clear cut until there's a legal test case. Given the hundreds of thousands of people affected maybe at least one person will take an agent to court. 

No need to got to Court - they are not challenging chargebacks on the whole, if the Law is unclear I wonder why ?
I'm not talking about a theoretical case but my own personal experience in the last few weeks.

eskbanker

Butts said:

No need to got to Court - they are not challenging chargebacks on the whole, if the Law is unclear I wonder why ?
I'm not talking about a theoretical case but my own personal experience in the last few weeks.

How many package holidays have you recently charged back?  The one you were citing on a lastminute.com thread related to an entirely different scenario involving cancelled flights rather than FCO advice so that wouldn't appear relevant here, but even if you'd chosen to cancel an OTB package due to FCO advice and they hadn't challenged a chargeback, that still doesn't extrapolate to demonstrating a legal right to a refund under the PTRs!

Re "they are not challenging chargebacks on the whole", even if you've successfully charged back an OTB package due to FCO advice, what evidence do you have that this is typical?

Upsidedownandaround

Butts said:

macman said:

Refer to your ATOL certificate, that will tell you if it is a package or not. But, if all under the same booking ref incl. the flights, then it probably is.
But no, you are not entitled to any refund, as both the accom and flights are available, and you are free to travel, subject to quarantine upon your return. FCO advice is just that-advisory.
Your best bet is to sit tight and hope that Ryanair cancel the flights. If they do, and it is a package, then you can claim a full refund from OTB.

So you disagree with the Package and Linked Travel Regulations 2018 and the Recent ABTA statement both of which say exactly the opposite ?

The holiday is still over a month away. As it stands he clearly is not entitled to a refund as Macman says. The Package and Linked Travel Arrangements 2018 and ABTA statements do not say anything about being entitled to a refund because FCO advice over a month in advance of your holiday advises you not to travel. The idea that a chargeback would be successfull a month before he is due to go on holiday is fanciful at best.