Europe a la Carte Blog

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I wasn’t exactly astounded to read that Brits spend more than half their holidays in their hotel and hotel room. If you think about it logically you probably spend eight hours in bed, one hour having showers, doing hair, make up etc and one hour eating breakfast. So already that’s a total of 10 hours in the hotel. If you are staying on half board you can add at least another hour to that. I don’t spend time in hotel bars (as I’m a Scot who never drinks alcohol), watching tv, sending text messages, checking emails or have a laptop with me.

I think it depends on the individual and the type of holiday. If we stay for a week in an apartment or hotel during a Winter Sun holiday we might spend a hour or two a day reading in the balcony but if we are on a touring holiday where we stay in a different hotel every night, we may spend very little time in the hotel if we arrive late and depart after breakfast.

Easycar.com have done some research into the causes of arguments between British couples when driving a hire car abroad. My ears pricked up at this as my husband and I will be hiring a car to explore off the beaten track in southern Tuscany and Umbria at the end of this month. It doesn’t exactly portent well with more than a third of couples arguing when driving abroad (I’m actually surprised it isn’t higher) with poor map reading skills being the most likely cause of the argument.

by finnur

I had to laugh at some of the tips in the article such as ask locals for direction, which should have the addition of “assuming that the locals can speak English well and are good at giving directions”. Another gem of wisdom was to play music that you both like (assuming that you both like the same music) as you’re unlikely to argue when your favourite tune is playing (would you like to bet on that?).

What are your tips for avoiding arguments when driving abroad?

I’m Scottish and moved to Berwick upon Tweed two years ago. I christened the area Scengland as it does feel like either Scotland or England to me. Berwick upon Tweed, lies in far north eastern corner of Northumberland. Evidently more than 60 % of Berwick residents would like be in Scotland. The majority party in the Scottish Government the Scottish National Party is ready to take legal action to achieve the transfer.

Berwick upon Tweed panorama

There’s been an ongoing debate on this topic as Berwick changed hands between England and Scotland 13 times between 1147 and 1482. Berwick lies 3 miles from the border with Scotland. The River Tweed forms a natural boundary through along most of the eastern border but the border line comes north a few miles before the east coast and Berwick, leaving Berwick in England.

In my opinion the tourist potential of Berwick is not being fully exploited and I’ve heard local people saying that if Berwick were in the Scottish Borders local authority it would be considered a “Jewel in the Crown”. It’s felt that Berwick is rather overlooked by the current administration. Berwick is a beautiful town lying on the Tweed Estuary. The old town in encircled by Elizabeth walls, there are lovely walks along the riverside and a beach at Spittal. I think it deserves to be guided in to a more high profile destination, whether that be by a Scottish or English administration.

Spittal Beach, Berwick upon Tweed

Evidently UK residents are willing to spend more time researching their holiday than their mortgage. While 36% of Brits spend more than 10 hours researching a leisure trip, only 22% would be wiling to spend this amount of time on finding the best mortgage deal.

Is this a rational use of time? I don’t think so. Finding a good mortgage deal could save you thousands of pounds a year. You may have to change mortgage every two to three years to ensure you find the most competitive product but think of all the extra holidays you could afford with the savings in interest repayments. I do appreciate that it’s probably more fun to do travel than financial research but doing thorough financial research and yes that does mean reading through the small print. is a good investment of your time.

Believe it or not, Scotland’s most iconic image is a disused coalmine, the Lady Victoria Colliery. The Colliery, which polled 20,000 votes, was voted top from a short list of ten archive images including Rosslyn Chapel and the Rennie Mackintosh School of Art in Glasgow.

Lady Victoria Colliery is now home to the Scottish Mining Museum.

Lady Victoria Colliery

Isn’t it amazing that a recent opinion poll highlights that US consumers are more satisfied with the customer service delivered by the IRS than by airlines.  The IRS scored 63%. 1% higher than the lowest scoring cable and satellite TV companies and 2% lower than the IRS. How can the tax office, grabbing the tax dollar, be rated higher for customer service than the airlines which in many cases are offering a leisure service?

It is perhaps because the IRS is viewed as a necessary evil and there are no expectations of great service whereas if you’re flying on a leisure trip you have connotations of a pleasant experience?

In the UK there is an acceptance that is you fly cheaply with a low cost airlines you have no illusions of good customer service but are fairly willing to accept this to in order to get your cheap flight. Does Ryanair spring to mind?

However I don’t see why this has to be the case. One of my biggest beefs with Ryanair is the scrum to board.  I don’t see that it would cost more to allocate you a seat during the booking process. Ryanair are also criticised for unfriendly staff,  if you’re at work anyway why not be pleasant?  I think it’s more of a management stance of disregard of customer service, which filters down to company culture.

What’s your opinion,  do you think that the tax office offers a better standard of service than the airlines?

It seems that my suspicions earlier this year about travellers claiming they wanted to be greener and taking on action of this front are all too true. According to a recent opinion poll only 7% of UK holidaymakers are willing to pay to offset the environmental effects of their trip. Could part of the reason by the doubling of Air Passenger Duty making us feel that we are already paying towards the detrimental effects of our flights? There’s also some mistrust of carbon offset schemes due to the lack of common standards and high admin charges. Or if it simply people paying lip service to concerns about the environment because it’s the fashionable thing to feign concern?

Carbon Cover Up by London Permaculture

So what’s your position on all this? Do you just want to be able to enjoy your holidays without being made to feel guilty and the whole issue is not top of your agenda? Are you taking active steps to reduce the impact of your travel by flying less, using other forms of transport such as trains or ferries and/or paying into carbon offset schemes?

According to a new survey 90% of online travel shoppers have experienced problems during the booking process in the last year. I can certainly testify to that as I had a problem in the last couple of months trying to book accommodation with On the Beach when arranging a DIY holiday to the Canaries. I thought I’d booked the accommodation twice in error, as when nothing happened during my first attempt to enter my credit card details, I tried again. I’d to wait 24 hours for On the Beach to get back to me to say they’d no record of my booking. It was all rather unnerving. I don’t think I’d visit the On the Beach site again.

Have you had any similar problems or have you been one of the lucky few for whom travel transactions have gone smoothly?

It seems that prefabs are on the up again with as the low cost solution to providing cheap and chic accommodation in cites. Qbic Hotels currently have one “out the box” hotels in Amsterdam, with Maastricht and Antwerp due to open early in 2008.

The central cube of a Qbic hotel room

The rooms are described as having cool and futuristic design. You can even change the colour of the lighting according to your mood. Rooms cost from 39 euros per night with pricing modelled on low cost airlines, so you’d have to book well in advance and be staying in low season to get the cheapest rates. I did a few searches for the Amsterdam hotel and the price varied between 59 - 129 euros per night.

You have to very careful when putting together your own holiday to avoid the potential of ending up being in difficulty and out of pocket if things go wrong during the trip. If you book a traditional package holiday with a travel agent then you’ll be covered. The mechanism for covering this is due to change next year with the proposed £1 ATOL Protection Contribution. However this will only cover package holidays. In the recent opinion poll more than half of travellers thought independently arranged flights should be covered too. At present you’re not covered if you book directly with a scheduled or low cost airline.

At present the best way to cover yourself when put together your ow holiday is to pay by credit card. Be aware that this only covers purchases of at least £100, so if you find a cheap flight there’s no benefit to paying by credit card.

The strange thing is that the charter flights I booked with flythomascook.co.uk for our pickage holiday are covered by ATOL. Therefore if the airline goes bust before we fly we’ll be reimbursed and if it happens when we’re away we’ll be flown home.

I booked the accommodation through medhotels.com paying by credit card which did not incur any additional charge. You must check that the name of the payee is the same as the supplier which is the case with medhotels. So far so good but I’ve paid the car hire by debit card to avoid a £3 charge on the £118 cost. Oh dear, if there’s no car when we arrive at the airport we’ve had it. However I rationalise that it’s no as much of a disaster as having to arrange our flights home or have to find another place to stay and lose the £275 that I paid for accommodation.

Another way to protect yourself is to purchase travel insurance which offers cover you for DIY holidays or dynamic packaging such as that offered by 1Stop Travel Insurance. It would probably take a while to get your money back as the failed company would have to be in liquidation before payout is made. However if the insurance premium is good value this is a virtually free additional safety net. Speaking of travel insurance, check that you are covered for terrorist attack.

By this stage you’re probably thinking this trip you’re plannng is supposed to be for pleasure not dodging through minefields. To put things into perspective I’ve taken many pickage holidays over the years and never had a problem but you never know. If I add up all the additional fees for credit card charges I could have paid over the years they would probably come to more a lot more than I stood to loose if one part of my holiday went wrong. For example I could have paid another £6 in credit card fees if I’d paid for our charter flights by credit card, if I hadn’t know I was covered by ATOL. It’s about knowing the facts and making your own decisions in full knowledge of the potential risks.