Return of deposit

woodfalls

Hello,
Pre-Covid in January last year I signed up for an event to take place in April 2021. To secure a place a payment of £500 needed to be made. The rest of the payment is now due and the organisers suggest insurance. The event takes place in Morocco, a country the FCO states not to travel to. I no longer want to take the trip for two reasons. 1. The difficulty in getting insurance. 2 I do not want to travel with the risk of Covid if the event does take place, as it’s over 1000 people from 30+ different countries. 

Can I claim my £500 back? The organisers say not. 
Thank you for any help.  

[Deleted User]

The organisers are correct.

Insurance would be your only option.

nyermen

Is this MdS out of interest?  Kudos if so (I've decided my limit is at the threshold trail series!).  

I ask because if so I would suggest if so you need special insurance anyway.  There's a risk of scorpion stings among other things, and I seem to recall the emergency recovery costs were on top.  Do the event recommend an insurer?  They may know specialist ones, who - bearing in mind the risk - I suspect Covid is a small part of the risk profiling?

Of course if this is something else, then perhaps google it anyway (marathon des sables) insurance as the insurance company may be able to cover you as it's specialist insurance not general holiday.

woodfalls

zx81 - I thought that might be the case, but hoped there might be an exception for things booked pre-Covid. 

woodfalls

Hi Nyermen. Yes it is MdS. Training is fully underway, but I feel that my preference would be to postpone till 2022, even if the race does go ahead in April 2021. There is specialist  insurance, but my issue is that I know already that I don’t want to be running abroad in a multi day event while Covid 19 is still relevant. I really want to know if I can get the initial £500 payment returned as the registration was made when World circumstances were rather different. Or could I only get it back if the event is postponed?

1trainer1

if this is for an event in 2021 and the event is still going ahead then they will not give you your money back, the only way they would normally would be for the event to be cancelled

eskbanker

woodfalls said:

I really want to know if I can get the initial £500 payment returned as the registration was made when World circumstances were rather different. Or could I only get it back if the event is postponed?

You'll be bound by a contract or terms of business that you will have signed up to, so you need to refer to that - this should include reference to any cancellation rights that you have and any associated costs thereof.

Some contracts contain terms that can be argued to be unfair though, but you'd need to be sure of your ground, i.e. an exact basis on which to challenge them, given your statutory rights in whatever jurisdiction the contract is formed in.

nyermen

Okay - maybe you should see if someone else will take your spot.  But congratulations on considering it - I stopped at the "mandatory kit including venom pump for scorpions" bit

I'm afraid I've got some bad news.  Check this page... https://www.marathondessables.com/en/2020-edition/race-regulation-2020#art26.  You may be liable for more than the deposit.

nyermen

ps. I believe country of contract is France.