In the early afternoon on Sunday, Gatwick airport arrivals level was a scene of frantic activity, as hundreds of holidaymakers who had been skiing during the second week of the Easter school holidays headed for home. How come? They were dropped there by a fleet of coaches provided by tour operators to get their guests back to Blighty in the continued absence of flights.

I and my family were on one such coach, provided by Courchevel/Val d’Isère chalet specialist Le Ski. We had left Courchevel at midnight. It had been a pretty unpleasant night for those of us with legs longer than the French norm, but we were all relieved to be on our way home, and any aches faded quickly once the sun rose over Champagne and the distance to Calais dropped below 300km. We arrived at Calais shortly before noon, the Channel was like a millpond, the sun continued to shine, and we were back at Gatwick only a couple of hours later than planned. Well done, Le Ski.

The much bigger band of holidaymakers who had travelled with the TUI operations (Crystal, Thomson, First Choice, Flexiski) are also reported to have been bussed back by early Monday morning – over 2,500 people in all.

And what about everyone else? I invite those who have or have not got back home to briefly tell their stories here.

I think that’s a great effort by your operator. As you say, a coach (I guess one that is normally used for airport transfers) is not the most comfortable way of spending a night but I do think Le Ski did well to get mobilised so quickly.

Had this happened mid season, it would have been an “interesting” time for all of us - and I think some hard pressed tour operators might well have been in real difficulty.

JJ

Well what a nightmare it has just taken me over 26 hours to return from Bsm/Les Arcs…....had the last flight out of Luton on the 15th April ,and my flight yesterday was cancelled, EasyJet were absolutely useless, and didnt even have any staff at the airport information desk, they were in fact SwissPort workers who were pushing passengers into paying upwards of 300SF each for a coach transfer to Calais.

Myself and three friends managed to get a hire car for 420 euros ( but had been quoted up to 900 euros for one days hire ,by various car hire companies), then next rip off was at Calais with P&O Ferries charging 65 euros for a 19 euro foot passenger ticket crossing and charging for babies aswell.

But we had it lucky some people had been charged 500 euros just to get four people from geneva train station to Paris , with no promise of an onward ticket to Calais for up to three days , in fact on one train the company hadnt put any refreshements on the service and passengers held the doors open thus stopping the train at each station and platform so parents could storm the cafes and shops to steal whatever they could get just to feed and rehydrate their children…...because they had been charged so highly for their tickets and had no money left.

So much for our lying Ministers apparently stating that no one was being ripped off and exploited by their need to get home etc.

But i would like to personnaly thank the chap at the Avis rental desk at Dover who rented me and my friends a car from Dover to Luton airport so we could pick up our car, instead of £300 he let us have it for £87…...my faith in human nature was restored for the time being…....judging by what people i/we spoke to….we got off lightly financially speaking, it was the famlies with small children who were robbed blind by various operators and travel companies.

Oh well heres to my next trip out to the alps….....which will be a self drive job from now on me thinks.

Jon I don’t think that you and I will agree on this.

The current regulations require airlines to act as free insurance companies whilst the companies to whom we have already paid our premiums get away scot free. I am desparately sorry for your truly horrible travel experience but I still think this should have been the responsibility of your insurer.

I am no fan of Ryanair nor of Michael O’Leary. However I can’t help agreeing with him that a low cost airfare should not entitle you or me to any recompense beyond what we paid for our ticket.

JJ

Hi JohnJ,

I must admit i do have some sympathy with the likes of Ryanair and to some extent EasyJet, they do enable through cheap flights and from what at most times is a good service the chance for people who by cost alone would never get the chance to travel abroad.

What does rile me though is that from what i have heard and been told is that the minute the airports etc were closed the shutters came down so nobody could get any info on their travel arrrangements etc unless they had mobile internet ,or someone at home who could get on the net for them to find out what was going on with their flights etc.

All lnadline connections were stopped and interupted etc ,in my case the airline who i had contracted with and paid monies to for my flight home ( EasyJet ) couldn’t even be bothered to have their own staff manning their own information desk at Geneva airport….which i find absolutely disgusting…..( i think EasyJets catchphrase instead of being “lets fly together ” , should be changed to ” in case of emergency…...run away and hide, your own your own pal”.

But to their credit after speaking to a human being at EasyJet , a lovely lady called Julia she informed me that i can make a claim via post ( claims for this episode are to be made using their online form for which you will need a scanner to scan bills and reciepts and import them into the form ) where as she says just post a covering letter with photocopies of all cancelled flight details and receipts for costs incurred in getting home and post them to customer services at Luton Airport ( EasyJet Airlines , Hanger 89 ) and they will take it from there.

Apart from medical insurance and buildings insurance ,it seems all other insurance policies are a complete waste of time and are nothing more than ways of parting people from their money with the false prospect of help in such times.

Oh well , heres to the next trip out to the alps

jon.

Yes point well made. Even when they can’t do that much to help, there is no excuse for poor (or in your case non-existent) customer service. Also whether I (or they) like it or not, the law’s the law, good or bad and they need to abide by it. It seems like insurance is a great business to be in at times like this!

Having been caught in India and delayed a week I noted a lot about what the airlines were doing.

According to information I received, EU airlines are legally obliged to look after passengers caught in the EU (which is why Ryanair is now offering some compensation). I would be really surprised if the airlines did not take out insurance to cover this potential liability.

Outside the EU they have no such obligation, so to paraphrase KLM “KLM did not cause the cancellation. It is not our fault. There will be no compensation. Go away.”. Though they did not answer any telephone queries they at least had the airport office open and were able to book me onto the first available flight home, 7 days later. BA passengers were nowhere near as lucky. I booked the flights myself so was able to sort it out myself, but colleagues who used a travel agency found the UK agency unable to act as quickly and found themselves paying over £2000 to get home.

Travel insurance companies appear to be taking a very varied approach with some claiming “act of god” hence no liability and others paying out.

How have people managed to get on with their travel insurance companies.

John