Ski holiday booking

brianj1991

Hello, I’m trying to understand my risk in this situation.

I’m booking a ski chalet in France through a British company (TTA member), paying by credit card and with travel insurance. The booking covers accommodation, meals, and airport transfers, all provided by company staff. The chalet itself may be owned by someone else.

Flights, lift pass, and ski hire are not included—it’s explicitly not sold as a package holiday, though the company can arrange extras separately.

Given recent chalet company failures, I’m cautious: their micro accounts show negative shareholder equity of ~£800k. If the company went bust—or simply failed to pay the chalet owner so our booking collapsed—where would I stand?

I assume I’d first go to the TTA (though I’ve read they may try to rehouse rather than refund). If unresolved, I’d claim on travel insurance, and finally Section 75. But if any payout came from any party, I expect it would only cover the original accommodation cost, leaving me out of pocket for flights and extras since they’d still technically be usable.

Also, does the Section 75 “debtor–creditor–supplier” rule apply if the chalet isn’t actually owned by the company, or would that block protection?

I’d appreciate any opinions.

la531983

My opinion would be not to even consider booking with them to begin with if you think they are going to go bust.

brianj1991

For context, I’m not sure or even well placed to say if they’re likely to bust. I stumbled across their micro accounts on a forum when researching for reviews. 

I suppose I’m interested in general, because I book with a small company each year, I know it’s an at-risk part of the industry, and I’m wondering how exposed I am. 

mr_stripey

From previous experience and anecdotal evidence from friends it is very hard to find insurance to cover "end user failure"  - this thread (albeit a year old) supports this hypothesis but does indicate LV still do cover this (or did at least)


https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6537167/end-supplier-failure-cover

MyRealNameToo

brianj1991 said:

Hello, I’m trying to understand my risk in this situation.

I’m booking a ski chalet in France through a British company (TTA member), paying by credit card and with travel insurance. The booking covers accommodation, meals, and airport transfers, all provided by company staff. The chalet itself may be owned by someone else.

Flights, lift pass, and ski hire are not included—it’s explicitly not sold as a package holiday, though the company can arrange extras separately.

Given recent chalet company failures, I’m cautious: their micro accounts show negative shareholder equity of ~£800k. If the company went bust—or simply failed to pay the chalet owner so our booking collapsed—where would I stand?

I assume I’d first go to the TTA (though I’ve read they may try to rehouse rather than refund). If unresolved, I’d claim on travel insurance, and finally Section 75. But if any payout came from any party, I expect it would only cover the original accommodation cost, leaving me out of pocket for flights and extras since they’d still technically be usable.

Also, does the Section 75 “debtor–creditor–supplier” rule apply if the chalet isn’t actually owned by the company, or would that block protection?

I’d appreciate any opinions.

The first thing would be to do a chargeback not S75; for a chargeback the DCS chain is irrelevant. 

If for some reason that failed then a S75 would be the next step. The relationship between the parties needs further investigation to say if it would work or fail. Hilton many years ago did big sell and rent back deals on their hotels but you dont hear of S75 claims being denied because property investors now owns the physical building. 

Insurance may be an option if both of these fail but end supplier failure is not a common coverage these days. 

born_again

As above if company selling holiday goes bust you action a chargeback.
But if flights are paid separate, & still fly then you can not claim for that part of the deal.

brianj1991

born_again said:

As above if company selling holiday goes bust you action a chargeback.
But if flights are paid separate, & still fly then you can not claim for that part of the deal.

I was thinking about the scenario where flights are paid separate but I do NOT fly, because I have nowhere to stay, so I have no choice but to stay at home. I assume the companies would all decline to payout for those, because the airline was still flying and I’ve ‘chosen’ not to fly.