Travel Disruption - Advice/Tips on Claims etc.

chipfork

We have been impacted by the situation in the Middle East. Our travel disruption soon pales into insignificance when compared to a very real plight people caught up in the conflict are facing.

We're looking for advice/tips for dealing with all the elements for quite a big trip. We've never claimed on travel insurance, I have rang the insurer for advice and keeping records of all calls, emails, messages is key. Also, making reasonable efforts to cancel and recoup spend which seems reasonable.

We were due to fly With Emirates to Sydney via Dubai with a return leg from Singapore with them, via Dubai. It was apparent days before that wasn't going to happen and they were directing people to cancel and complete a refund request which had links to their fare rules. We were advised to wait for them to cancel the flight, which they did at 4 am on the day we were due to fly. Obviously they are snowed under. It took me over 100 calls to get in touch prior to the flight to see if they could re-route via another carrier, which they wouldn't do. Possibly because the Singapore Airlines flight was 3 times the cost of our Emirates ticket. Still trying to get through to discuss a refund.

We used Booking.com and Hotels.com for the 4 hotels we had booked, most non-refundable, so contacted the hotels to see if they can offer any goodwill and one already has. Any advice on this would be helpful as both those travel providers are difficult to get in touch with.

We had internal connecting flights in Australia to resolve. It's time consuming but anything that can help us prepare and minimise the backwards and forwards will be a big help.

saajan_12

How flexible are you on dates?

Few options, you might try more than one in parallel and see what sticks.

1. Hotel cancellations: From my understanding, the hotel providers aren't obligated to refund you, but if they do as goodwill or give you credits to move to another date, that might suit.
2. Airline: This is an extraordinary event out of their control, so no compo due. However if you chose rerouting, they should get you to your destination on the reasonably earliest option. If they are uncontactable then worst case you could book another airline yourself and then claim the cost back. You should get the flight cost, reasonable taxis, meals etc. However there is the risk of recovering the money, or them refusing because they resumed operations. If you go this route, make it clear you want a REROUTE, not a REFUND at all times.
3. Insurance: You may be able to claim for trip disruption, but you'd need to check for any exclusions for war, conflicts, etc. [IMO that's crazy, the whole point of insurance is to cover the extreme, and this is extreme! but is what it is..]

chipfork

Hi ssajan_12, thanks for your reply.

In terms of flexibility, we had none due to the dates for hotels, internal transfers, etc. It would have been an organisational nightmare but worse still we were tied to holiday dates with both our jobs. A day or two would have been manageable, but with just 16 hours notice following the cancellation we had little in the way of options. So we took the decision to cancel the trip and try again next year.

1. We had a booking through hotels.com (Expedia) and the hotel said that in light of the situation they would happily waive the charge. So hotels.com are to speak to the hotel and make a decision. One was refundable and that's now cancelled. The other two I am waiting a response from.
2. We didn't expect compensation. Understandably, Emirates are impossible to reach, I tried constantly after confirmation of the cancellation, no joy. When I did get through, before the cancellation, they said they could cancel and refund then but I wanted to wait until they cancelled. I explained our favoured option was re-routing and shared a Singapore Airlines flight that had seats and would have been ideal. They said they couldn't offer that option. The Singapore Airlines flight was nearly 3 times the cost of our Emirates flight and we were advised that if we booked it ourselves then it was unlikely Emirates would cover that. We've now completed the refund form, someone we know who was flying to Dubai did that and got refunded quite quickly.
3. I've read through the insurance and I can't see anything obvious. I will run it through AI to see if it can find any clauses. I guess when submitting the claim we'll know. Everything was booked with a credit card so that is an option in terms of claiming back, I guess a last resort. Again having never claimed through travel insurance or from a credit card, it's understanding which route is best and how to approach this.

Thanks