Voucher or cash?
What you urgently need to know if the package tour was canceled due to Corona
Created: 01/14/2022, 12:42 p.m
By: Ines Baur
Not a rare sight - since the beginning of the pandemic, traveling is no longer a matter of course.
Many trips were canceled by organizers or customers.
(icon image).
© picture alliance / dpa |
Daniel Bockwoldt
The corona pandemic has changed travel significantly.
Holidays are cancelled, organizers have to cancel trips.
What options are there for failed services?
Munich - If you go on a trip, you can experience something.
If someone
doesn't make a
trip - he can do that too.
Reversal, cancellation or voucher modalities.
Consumers sometimes have more to consider if they don't start their holiday trip than if they start their trip as planned.
And not only when they withdraw from the trip themselves.
But also if the organizer cancels the package tour.
Cash or voucher - it's up to the customers
If a tour operator has to cancel a package tour because of Corona, consumers have two options, according to the consumer advice center: they could accept a voucher or request reimbursement of the payments made so far.
Voucher:
If you don't really need the money and want to show solidarity with the tour operator, you can do without the timely repayment of your money. And accept the voucher offered. Providers want to keep their customers and often offer replacement vouchers that are worth significantly more than the original trip. Win-win for both sides, because it can always be worthwhile for the consumer to forego the immediate repayment.
Money back
: The situation is different if people who want to go on holiday want their money back and are not at all interested in the voucher solution.
In this case, it is advisable to write to the package tour provider and insist on reimbursement of the payments made to date.
"You should set a period of 14 days," advises the consumer center.
A sample letter can be found on the consumer advice center website.
This applies to secured travel vouchers from 2022
Anyone who has a state-backed voucher in their house - as a replacement for a trip booked before March 8, 2020 and canceled due to the pandemic - must know that it lost its validity on December 31, 2021.
But: "Since then, the tour operators have been obliged to pay out the value of the unused vouchers within 14 days," according to the consumer advice center.
If the travel agency makes an offer to extend such a voucher, consumers are well advised to consider whether they want to accept the offer.
The fact is that these vouchers are no longer insured against the insolvency of the organizer.
"We therefore advise redeeming the open Corona voucher quickly or requesting the value payment," writes the consumer advice center.
Package tour or no package tour?
A package tour is a trip in which you receive various travel services as an overall package from the provider.
This can be a combination of flight plus hotel plus rental car, for example.
As a rule, you book in the travel agency in this way.
If the customers have booked the various individual services with different providers and paid the invoices separately, it is an individual trip.
Other rights apply.
Around 57.8 million passengers took off or landed at the 24 largest commercial airports in Germany in 2020.
As the Federal Statistical Office also reports, that was 74.5 percent less than in the previous year.
This is the lowest value since German unification.
In 2019, a record number of passengers was recorded with 226.7 million passengers.
