The timing of the booking doesnt seem to make any difference as tho who they choose to be overbooked ( beats me why ). 2 bed appartments are normally in short supply in many resorts.

What can you do:

1. Accept a full refund as this is a major change but this means you will have to find an alternative holiday on the same budget, normally difficult at this late stage.

2.Write a letter accepting the change under duress explain you reserve the right to claim compensation on your return if the alternative accommodation is not up to the standard that you booked ( which it clearly isnt ).

Could you contact the hotel directly to see if they have any 2 or 3 bed appartments available. Is there any other accommodation within Globespans website that you prefer the look of ?

Kind Regards
Stewart

I posted this on another thread a little while ago and it may help to explain regarding "overbookings" - usually, it isn't the Tour Operator who is at fault....

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From experience working in tour ops, I'm aware that as a rule - it isn't the tour operator that overbooks guests...

Most operators have a policy that they have an allocation of a certain number of rooms at the units they contract. If, within a certain number of weeks or days even - the tour op hasn't filled all their allocation, the hotelier can take the rooms back from the contract and sell them direct to the public.

What usually happens, is the hotelier sells the rooms from the allocations earlier than the agreed time period. He sells them at a higher price than he gets from the tour operator, so of course - he is very happy! He does this for 2 reasons
1) Because there is usually a cancellation of a booking or two before the guests arrival
2) Because he makes more money this way

The problem arises, when the rooming lists are sent out by the tour operator to the hotel (usually within 2 weeks of the guests arrival) and the hotelier suddenly realises he doesn't have enough rooms available.

The tour operator then has to start looking for alternatives to fit the requirements and hopefully, same standard as that already booked by the guests.

In your circumstances, it does sound like this may be what has happened and the only option to sleep the number in your party with self catering facilities was to provide 2 1 bedroom apartments in another unit (probably one they already contract). This is always the better/cheaper option for the tour operator as they will have to pay more for a room if it's in a hotel/unit they don't have a contractual agreement with.

However, if the tour operator has taken a "guaranteed" contract, which means they agree to take every room in the unit - they will always try to fill those rooms first. Usually, these are the hotels that generally appear in the very 1st edition brochure that goes on sale for each season. Late savers and allocation on arrival holidays will generally be put into these units before any others as the tour operator gets the best deal from the hotel on this type of contract. Once the rooms are fully booked then they move onto whatever is available in their contracted units.

It's almost impossible for a tour operator to overbook guests on their own reservations system. The only way this can happen is if the resort office does manual allocations or if the tour operator has loaded their room capacities incorrectly.

If the hotel unit has sold the rooms out of the allocation, the tour operator will usually claim all or part of any compensation paid out to their guests (you) for the inconvenience.

Sorry, a bit long!

CwB

thanks for the replies.

Globespan actually ended up being quite helpful given the circumstances, and a full refund was never in doubt if I had wanted it.

They offered alternative accommodation in both Majorca and the Alrgarve so it looks like its all sorted at the end of the day.