We have finally had a reply from Thomson loss adjusters re our claim. They have returned our original cheque for £26.99 & also another one for £26.99, making a total of £53.98 in payment of our claim for approx £99.
Whilst we are very unhappy at this amount we feel that we are now at the end of the road.
However the adjusters have shot Thomson in the foot as we think they have handled our claim very badly & also we think Thomson have "A duty of care" towards their clients and judging by the number of comments on this site alone they (Thomson) must have known this was a problem at Bourgas.
With this in mind we have taken the decision NOT TO BOOK OR TRAVEL WITH THOMSON in future so after the thousands ofpounds they have had off us in the last ten years we hope they make a lot of profit on nothing in future
Bill & Rachel Haighton

Thanks for that mondeo.got some really strange looks from airport security at Cuba a couple of years ago.Hopefully there will be no problems in Bulgaria.10 weeks and counting.Can't wait.

Many thanks

Sharpy

When were in Bulgaria last year we heard that Copenhagen Airport A/S had been awarded concessions for all Bulgaruian Airports in return for investments totalling 500 million. It was rumoured that Bourgas was to be done this winter and ready for the first tourist to arrive this year. There was to be an extension to Arrivals and Departures and a second runway built. Can anyone confirm whether this work has gone ahead as it took us over 90 minutes to get through arrivals last year and I just wondered if I have it again to look forward to.

Allan

The Copenhagen Airports deal is, as far as I recall, still tied up in legal wrangles through the Bulgarian courts - the deal allegedly didn't go through the correct tendering processes.

Baldur

<Edit> For more info see the story 'Bulgarian court to deliver final ruling on airport concession deal in a month' dated 21/1/06 HERE.

Hi Sharpy

One thing which has always helped me get through Bourgas airport arrivals quickly, is that I always say to the police at the desk when handing over my passport either Dobre Den, or Dobre Vetcher, depending on the time of arrival it seems to make them move a little bit quicker when checking the passport.;

Hi Mondeo,

The speed (or lack thereof) of the computer systems which access the Border Police database probably has more to do with how quickly you get through than any 'dobro utro', 'dobur den' or 'dobur vecher', but it is good to be polite and the effort is appreciated by most Bulgarians.

Baldur

Hi Baldur .

dont know about that the other thing i seem to be able to manage is get of that bus quick get into arrivals and get to a box before anybody else + having a passport picture which has me wearing a Bulgarian national team shirt helps as well as the amount of stamps in the passport for Bulgaria, and as you say being polite and being able to speak to them helps

been to both Bourgas and Varna lots of times and had no problems,
Of course its not like any in the uk, so quit moaning and count yourself lucky you are in Bulgaria now before it is ruined like most European places,
As for airports my biggest problems have been with so called local flights belfast to london etc, dont even get me started on them

Hi can anyone tell me how much roughly is a taxi from Bourgas Airport to Sunny Beach we are staying at the Lion Beach Hotel has anyone stayed here if so what is it like??

Many Thanks

Hi,

You will probably find the answer to your question in this thread

Baldur

Hi Clare,

Using google you can find some mention of the Hotel Lion Beach -

HERE

You might get a better response if you ask about the hotel in a separate post.

Peter

just a simple question for those been or going to bourgas airport
how long did it take to get thru passport control?

See Julie Matthews's post HERE for her experience.

Much will depend on time of day, how many flights arrive at a similar time to yours, availability of Border Guard staff, etc.

Baldur

Hi Clareb, You will probably find the cost to Sunny Beach by taxi around the 30-35 Leva mark if you are going now. Little bit cheaper Sept. onwards. However, make sure you agree a price first with the driver.

The Toonman

After reading through this thread im a bit worried about what has been going on at bourgas airport, has anyone been through this year and have any suitcases been tampered with?

We arrived late on Monday/Tuesday 29/30 May 2006. Monday apparently is one of the busiest days. There were approx 5 flights landed before us and there were at least 500 people trying to get through only 5 passport control desks that were open. On 2 of the desks there were no proper queues and it was an absolute free for all. By managing to spot a control desk with a proper queue it took us an hour getting through - other people took 2 hours.
We had hoped that our suitcases would be waiting on the other side. However the 2 carousels were completely full of suitcases belonging to people who were obviously still stuck on the other side of passport control and we had to wait another hour for our cases.
I did however speak to people who went through last Monday 5th and they seemed to have had no problems as all the passport control desks were open.
We had no problems on our return journey yesterday 12 June. No suitcases were tampered with although reps did warn us that all outgoing cases would be scanned and any any tobacco in excess of permitted limits seized.
Drink prices at Bourgas Duty Free for alcohol seemed reasonable e.g. a litre bottle of Finlandia Vodka was priced at 10 Euros. All prices are in Euros although the duty free shop also accepts sterling and levs. The gave a fairly poor exchange rate on sterling i.e. £1 = 1.30 Euros.

is this place as bad as it sounds we fly in on the 18/07/06 its a night flight
will this make any difference iv been told its very dated and only one plane in at a time is this true

hi, i got back from sunny beach yesterday, had a fantastic time, but like many people on this site, i think that borgas airport was a disgrace!!! we queued for 45 minutes to get though check in, which we didn't mind that much, but then queued another 50 minutes to get through passport control. there were only 3 people checking passports, and they were taking about 5 minutes for each passport. when it was my turn to go through i couldn't belive my eyes. the guy i went to took my passport and sat there a couple of minutes before even doing anything at all, he just sat back as though there was no rush. thats why it took so long there, they were just not bothered at all. this was all made worse by the fact that there was no air conditioning at all!!!!
i have read on this site though that people have had problems with there luggage, but we had no problems at all, we got our bags quite quickly when we arrived and they were in perfect condition, and they were in perfect condition when we got back yesterday.

just returned this morning - the airport is a nightmare. going out there last tuesday it took us 2 1/2 hours to get our cases, then by the time we got to our allocated coach they couldn't fit our cases on so the rep ordered a taxi for us and said we should get there before the coach so we weren't too bothered BUT the taxi driver didn't have a clue where sun village was and we spent about 40 minutes driving around looking for it- not the best start! coming back whent he coach pulled up outside departures it was just chaos -we had to wait outside for about an hour before we even found out which desk we needed- we eventually got the boarding cards and had to go through passport control - only 1 desk open of course -on the plus side we only had to wait about 10 minutes before boarding after that. Airport is pretty grotty but happy to hear that they are planning to spend some money on it -until then i think i will avoid!
no problems with the baggage though!