Can I drive back to the UK from Italy – and avoid quarantine?

Q I’m in Italy right now and planning to drive through Switzerland on Monday, then stay Germany overnight and fuel up in Aachen and on to the tunnel in Calais. I believe we’ll be OK if we don’t stop in Switzerland, Belgium, Holland and France?

Nick S

A As the UK government extends its web of “no-go” quarantine restrictions further across Europe, the problems for travellers are multiplying.

The government’s decision on Thursday evening to give a 35-hour window for people actually on holiday in Switzerland or the Czech Republic incentivises all kinds of risk-heavy behaviour, such as very long drives late at night to beat the 4am deadline.

Fortunately, being in Italy you are in a much stronger position. Unlike rail passengers, the car driver can successfully make it from Italy to the UK without triggering an obligation to self-isolate for 14 days once back.

With Switzerland stripped of its quarantine exemption, there is now a “red wall”: France, Switzerland and Austria form a barrier to the traveller. Were you a passenger on a train, travelling across any of these would make you liable for quarantine. But you can drive through without stopping. For France, the distance is simply impossible to achieve, so you must instead focus on Switzerland or Austria.

Personally I would avoid Switzerland in favour of the Brenner Pass from Italy into Austria and across into Bavaria; a much shorter transit than Switzerland, a very scenic drive and depositing you in one of the loveliest parts of Germany.

Whether you chose Austria or Switzerland, you will need to apply for a “vignette” – toll sticker – in advance.

Once in Germany, I suggest you make the most of the journey. Explore southern Bavaria. Ideally pause in Neuschwanstein for Ludwig II’s magnificent Schloss and wander along the northern shore of Lake Constance. Then explore the Black Forest, much quieter than normal, and ideally stay overnight in the fine spa town of Baden Baden.

As you say, Aachen is the place to head for replenishment before the four-hour nonstop drive across Belgium and France to Calais. Unlike ferry travellers, motorists using Eurotunnel are able to avoid quarantine.

open image in gallery

Q Does the Foreign Office always announce the latest countries to be taken off the exempt list on a Thursday night, with a deadline of Saturday morning? We are planning to travel back from Germany to the UK next Monday, using Eurotunnel from Calais to Folkestone, and were wondering whether to make additional contingency plans. What do you think?

Tony H

A The Thursday evening “go/no-go” announcement isn’t exactly a tradition yet. Indeed, since the 10 July easing of quarantine from a select group of countries, there have been five separate reimpositions made – and only two of them were on a Thursday evening. It is a month to the day since the Saturday evening when the government suddenly announced, at five hours’ notice, that arrivals in the UK from Spain would need to quarantine.

After that, Luxembourg and then Belgium were proclaimed to be high risk in midweek. But the last two downgradings of countries have been revealed on Thursday evenings. On 13 August, quarantine exemption was removed from France and the Netherlands, and a week later Austria and Croatia were placed on the no-go list. In both cases, the deadline given was 4am on Saturday.

Government, the media and the public have, I believe, a preference for regularity, and so I would not be surprised if the present “system” continues for a few more weeks. But the chopping and changing has been distressing for travellers and destructive for the travel industry.

At present, everywhere is deemed to be high risk, with exemptions made. I predict that by autumn we will be back to the original system as prevailed in late February and early March, whereby everywhere is deemed to be low risk, with exceptions made for some clearly high-risk locations. I should warn you that a number of my predictions have been wrong during the coronavirus pandemic.

But let me also predict that Germany will remain on the low-risk register until next Monday. Just remember to drive straight through Belgium and France from Aachen in Germany (the closest point to the Eurotunnel terminal at Calais) without stopping.

open image in gallery

Q We booked a cruise on Queen Mary 2 from Southampton to New York in November 2021, then sailing on Anthem of the Seas to the Bahamas and back, and spending four nights in a New York hotel at the end.

The trip to celebrate my retirement, which we booked with an agent, cost just over £7,700. We have paid £2,200 as a deposit. Subsequently we were advised of a major family event, which we must attend, arranged on a day in the middle of the above period.

The agent says that any change, whether shifting by a month or cancelling altogether, would mean losing the entire deposit. What would you suggest so I don’t have to go down the legal route?

Keith L

A Sorry to see you were talked into committing, many months ahead, for a trip at a time of year which is as low season as it gets. While I am all in favour of anticipation as a key element of travel, I discourage long-horizon bookings for off-peak dates. There is rarely any financial advantage and, as you discovered, unexpected events can intervene.

The standard default is that your deposit is non-refundable. Some legal claims for cancelled holidays have succeeded where the passenger who had to cancel could demonstrate that the trip was subsequently resold. Given the separate elements in your trip, I fear this will not be a viable option.

Instead, I suggest you wait patiently. Presumably the £5,500 balance will not be due for a good while. Given the calamitous circumstances in which the cruise industry finds itself, I believe there is a good chance that either or both of the voyages will be cancelled – or amended so substantially that it constitutes a “significant change”.

This week Cunard announced that it will not sail until next spring, and that its schedules and ambitions for the summer will be much curtailed. Plans for the autumn of 2021 will not be revealed for a few months but they could be drastically changed. That will enable you to cancel the whole package for a full refund of everything you have paid so far.

If I am wrong, and both cruises proceed exactly as planned, then I have one more suggestion: a lightning trip back to the family event. It might work for you, for example, to fly from New York to the UK, attend the event and then fly back to the Bahamas. Disruptive but feasible.

open image in gallery

Q My daughter has been on a four-month quest to secure a refund for a £2,300 touring holiday in the Far East that she bought from STA Travel – which, as you have reported, has now ceased trading. The trip she bought from STA included flights with Emirates and Jetstar, and hop-on hop-off travel provided by Bamba Experience. She paid the deposit and balance by debit card.

The situation, though, now seems to be taking twists and turns never before envisaged. Part of the problem is that an Atol certificate was never issued. Unfortunately she is unable to claim a “chargeback” through her debit card as her bank says there isn’t anyone they can charge back from, given STA’s administration. Meanwhile, her travel insurer says it won’t pay because “there are legal requirements for another to refund in full”. Where do I begin?

Steve L

A A week on from the sad demise of STA Travel UK, your daughter is one of many customers facing labyrinthine complexity in trying to reclaim their hard-earned cash. For the past five months, the student and young traveller specialist has been fending off claims, often issuing refund credit notes rather than hard cash.

For those who booked package arrangements and have an Atol certificate to prove it, the collapse of STA actually makes life easier. They can begin the process of claiming a full cash refund from the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), which administers the Atol scheme.

Flight-only customers, meanwhile, are advised to contact the airline. Your daughter, though, through no fault of her own, is stuck in a special spiral of financial misery. I find it unlikely that someone at STA Travel deliberately chose not to issue an Atol. It may have been a mistake, or possibly there could have been some other reason – such as buying the trip elements on different days.

I suggest her first step is to ask the CAA to look at her holiday contract and assess whether it should have been financially protected. I contend that if it was a package, then there is a moral obligation to pay her money back from the Atol fund. If the CAA disagrees, it should provide a refusal in writing in order that your daughter can proceed with the next step: trying that “chargeback” one more time.

Chargeback is offered by Visa, American Express and Mastercard, and provides for a refund if you pay for goods or services that are not delivered – clearly the case for your daughter.

I am puzzled by the bank’s first response, saying there is no one it can claim from because STA is defunct. Her bank should be requesting the refund from STA’s bank, not the travel firm’s sadly empty account. But the chargeback scheme is only voluntary. A refusal will leave her with one last option: travel insurance. If she can demonstrate she has tried every avenue without success, she should be able to claim – and if that is turned down, she can go to the Financial Ombudsman Service and ask for another option.

This is not going to be a speedy or fun experience, though.

Email your question to s@hols.tv or tweet @simoncalder