depends WHO they are, most of our holidays over the last 8 yrs have been "built by the travel agent" I count myself lucky i haven't had anything go wrong, this is mainly because we specify not budget airlines and specify travel times, we have always got a good deal but not necessarily the cheapest [as we also will not accept night flights] Try using the search facility using the name of the travel agent and see what post we have on them

wizard

With 17 failures so far this year I personally would be very wary of booking anything except with a well established TO. I appreciate that there are very many successful and trustworthy companies out there but in the present climate I can well understand how they feel. The suggestion of doing a search of HT is the best advice and if you cannot find them I am sure some of our members may be able to advise if you post who they are.

I do have sympathy for those companies who are safe and one commentator did say that these companies could suffer because or the rogue element we seem to have.

fwh

hi brian-the-gent.....be careful if a package is being built for you....and by whom....they themselves need to have ATOL / ABTA registration to sell a complete true package....meaning you have a contract with the company selling you it....ask for thier regestration number and check it exists and is in force on the ATOL/ABTA sites......

some say its a package which if it was would have protection under ATOL/ABTA ....but it might really be what is called a dynamic package and is not fully covered in the event of a failure or companies going bankrupt ....it may look the same as a package in a brouchur ....it may be the same airline, transfers and hotel....the difference is the person selling it to you is really only acting as an agent for the companies who provide the flight transfers and hotel...they book on your behalf with the airline transfer company and hotel seperately ....and so in reality you have 3 different contracts with 3 different companies ....and not covered by ATOL as a package holiday

the flights would be covered....but if airline failed and you couldnt get another flight you would not get re-embursed for the hotel and transfers....as they were on a seperate contract and still available...the fact you had no way of using them has no bearing on the situation

so I would be very careful given the nature of the market just now....and especially if booking for someone else and them being elderly......given your situation I would opt for one from a well known TA/TO .....maybe thats what your elderly friends are asking you to do...maybe they are aware of the problems just now and are asking you in thier own way to book them a safe package....tweetie

ps ....please correct me if Ive got it wrong

they were happy to sell me the holiday at a better price however would'nt book holiday at dearer price from a holiday brochure

I suspect that it was because there would be a higher profit margin for them on a package they put together based on booking the flights and hotel etc direct compared to booking an off the shelf package from another TO. They would only receive commission on a sale from another TOs brochure and that TO would get the biggest share of the difference between the actual cost of the holiday and the price paid by the customer. The reason why they can afford to undercut the brochure price from one of the 'big boys' in the first place is because there's only one company taking a profit out of the sale.

Everybody elses' advice about making sure that whoever you do book through is properly bonded etc still holds true, as does checking whether they are using an intermediary for booking the flights etc.

SM

actually found out the company in question don't sell holidays out of tour operators brochures. did book holiday with another company out of a brochure.