WAITING FOR LUGGAGE: That sinking feeling
April 18, 2019
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We had a small group of six family and friends travelling around the world for a five-week holiday. Unfortunately, eight days into their trip, one of the travelling party’s husbands back at home in Australia contracted a serious illness and was placed on life-support. Naturally, they began making urgent travel plans for the wife to return home. Initially, they tried using the hotel concierge to arrange flight plans, though this was unsuccessful. The sister then remembered that we, their travel agents, could be contacted at any time.
As soon as they called, we started work on getting her back ASAP. We arranged a ‘meet and assist’ between three different airlines to make the process of transferring between flights one less thing she had to deal with. We also liaised with her son in Australia and gave him the revised travel details, so that he knew when she would be flying back and when pick her up at the airport.
The wife returned home to be by her husband’s side, who unfortunately passed away. The remainder of the group were kept informed about what was happening, and when the funeral details were confirmed I coordinated urgent travel arrangements for the rest of the family to return home.
Only one person had taken a travel insurance policy with us (the others relied on travel insurance via their credit card), so we could only be sure that single traveller was covered for the event. Regardless, and without knowing what their credit card insurance was going to cover, we reworked the fares to be the lowest cost possible that would get them home in time for the funeral.
Throughout the calls, you could hear the relief in the voices of the family members, knowing that there was a qualified ATAS accredited travel agent at the other end dealing with it all.
Booking with an accredited ATAS travel agent and taking out travel insurance is essential when travelling overseas. It enables you to travel with peace of mind, knowing that in the unfortunate event that something does go wrong, such as sick family member, you have an accredited travel specialist on your side to get you home quickly, safely and with minimal or no extra costs.
ATAS accredited agents are trusted, reliable and trained travel professionals. Booking with an ATAS accredited agent means you’re in safe hands and can travel with confidence.
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