How movable and refundable are Easyjet flights

CKhalvashi

jimi_man said:

sleepwouldbenice said:

Thanks all - so overall we would lose seats and luggage spend as well if we had to cancel (we have a 15 year old who will be up to date with uk jabs but heaven only knows if the uk will keep up with european rules so she might not be able to travel) and I should have realised they wouldnt refund the difference

Oh well at least the risk is clearer, now to think about insurance......

I don't know where exactly you are travelling to but it's worth bearing in mind that with BA you don't lose everything. You can cancel up to an hour before the flight goes and you get a Flight Voucher for the amount of the flights, which can be used anywhere on their network, not just to that destination. 

Worth bearing in mind - assuming BA go to the destination you want to go to. 

And on a recent trip for a return flight to Poland, BA wanted £128, LOT wanted £96, Easyjet around £66, Ryanair £42, I paid £17.98pp with Wizz. I'd have had to self-transfer to Krakow with BA for the self-connecting flight I wanted, mainly to avoid the band B APD, but the return flight on that sector was 98PLNpp

To me it's not worth paying an extra £110pp plus travel expenses to know I'll get my money back in vouchers to use on more overpriced flights. BA's network is appalling and they don't currently fly to anywhere I personally really want to go.

In most of Europe now, it's worth choosing the cheapest possible flights and self-insuring assuming you can be a little flexible. Some dates a traditional airline will be cheaper, but not many.

jimi_man

CKhalvashi said:

jimi_man said:

sleepwouldbenice said:

Thanks all - so overall we would lose seats and luggage spend as well if we had to cancel (we have a 15 year old who will be up to date with uk jabs but heaven only knows if the uk will keep up with european rules so she might not be able to travel) and I should have realised they wouldnt refund the difference

Oh well at least the risk is clearer, now to think about insurance......

I don't know where exactly you are travelling to but it's worth bearing in mind that with BA you don't lose everything. You can cancel up to an hour before the flight goes and you get a Flight Voucher for the amount of the flights, which can be used anywhere on their network, not just to that destination. 

Worth bearing in mind - assuming BA go to the destination you want to go to. 

And on a recent trip for a return flight to Poland, BA wanted £128, LOT wanted £96, Easyjet around £66, Ryanair £42, I paid £17.98pp with Wizz. I'd have had to self-transfer to Krakow with BA for the self-connecting flight I wanted, mainly to avoid the band B APD, but the return flight on that sector was 98PLNpp

To me it's not worth paying an extra £110pp plus travel expenses to know I'll get my money back in vouchers to use on more overpriced flights. BA's network is appalling and they don't currently fly to anywhere I personally really want to go.

In most of Europe now, it's worth choosing the cheapest possible flights and self-insuring assuming you can be a little flexible. Some dates a traditional airline will be cheaper, but not many.

I've just come back from Barcelona yesterday. It was £30 each way (including hold baggage if you wanted to take some). I could have cancelled up to check in time and rebooked to anywhere on their network for free. If the flight was cheaper then I would get the difference and vice versa. And it's pretty quick - couple of minutes it comes through. No hassle about 'self insuring' and then having to go through and claim it all back. Having to take out insurance to cope with cancelling a flight just seems nonsensical. 

It's horses for courses. Nothing on earth would convince me to fly with Ryanair or Wizz - however I accept that everyone is different.

We see countless threads on here where people have booked with 'budget' airlines and then when it inevitably goes wrong because of Covid, they are stuck because their refund policies are just rubbish. In general you get what you pay for.

eskbanker

jimi_man said:
No hassle about 'self insuring' and then having to go through and claim it all back. Having to take out insurance to cope with cancelling a flight just seems nonsensical.

I think one or the other of us may be misunderstanding what @CKhalvashi means by 'self-insuring' here - to me it means not actually taking out insurance as such, and just accepting the risk of potential losses (where these are seen as small enough to warrant this approach), rather than arranging separate independent insurance cover as such.

jimi_man

eskbanker said:

jimi_man said:
No hassle about 'self insuring' and then having to go through and claim it all back. Having to take out insurance to cope with cancelling a flight just seems nonsensical.

I think one or the other of us may be misunderstanding what @CKhalvashi means by 'self-insuring' here - to me it means not actually taking out insurance as such, and just accepting the risk of potential losses (where these are seen as small enough to warrant this approach), rather than arranging separate independent insurance cover as such.

Ah I see, thank you.

CKhalvashi

eskbanker said:

jimi_man said:
No hassle about 'self insuring' and then having to go through and claim it all back. Having to take out insurance to cope with cancelling a flight just seems nonsensical.

I think one or the other of us may be misunderstanding what @CKhalvashi means by 'self-insuring' here - to me it means not actually taking out insurance as such, and just accepting the risk of potential losses (where these are seen as small enough to warrant this approach), rather than arranging separate independent insurance cover as such.

Exactly.

I hold insurance that would have covered should either Poland or Georgia's borders had closed, however the excess would have been £50, 2 sets of separate return flights on different bookings were around £36.

As happened, an extra day in Krakow was required due to the originally booked flight to Luton being cancelled, at which point it was cheaper to spend a day in Poland (110zl for accommodation) than it was to attempt to re-book flights at this point with another airline.

With the amounts being around £20 in this case, there was no point making an insurance claim IMO, however for larger amounts it definitely would have been.