hi
we haven't booked anything yet but......
hubby and i fancy a caribbean cruise with thomson in march 09. have priced it up on thomson website as £2970 for both of us for two weeks which includes a drinks package at £338pp. We are considering adding the premium flight upgrade too at £289pp as we've never flown long haul before so don't know what to expect from economy - both of us hate flying anyway and hubby is nearly 5'10" and likes to stretch!
anyway, i thought i'd phone my local high street thomson to see if they can beat the price - i asked them if they could reduce (or throw in like they did this year.....) the drinks package or indeed reduce the flight premium should we choose to have it. but the girl said they could only increase the actual saving on the holiday and that was at the manager's disrection (i got another £100 out of her on this by the way). she said they weren't allowed to touch the drinks package or the flight premium because that's dictated by head office. is this true does anyone know?
my friend reckons i should haggle a bit more with the high street agent and/or leave it until after 25th Jan when prices apparently will come down????
what do you all think?
I think that you will probably have reached the limit of what you can get now from Thomson shops, it might be worth trying some other travel agents with your lowest price (I have found Coop Travelcare good) and see if they can match or better still beat it for you.
A couple of things you should note is that the price of holidays is rising steadily TUI / First Choice prices have risen by over 12% in the last 8 weeks and TUI (Thomson) has already stated that they will be increasing the price of next years holidays by up to 10% and reducing capacity by 27% over the next 2 years.
Is it also worth waiting to see if the price goes down in 5 weeks time when it might just as easily go up the holiday might also get fully booked, particularly the upgraded seats on the plane.
Just to muddy the water, travel companies like so many are feeling the economic pinch so it is well worth haggling hard to see if they will give just a little more.
These are thing you should ask yourself and if you are happy with the price now just book it.
I did a search on Say no to 0870 for a local number and found a fab agent who gave me the Thomson holiday I wanted at Portlands web price.
The Co-opertaive Travel have some fantastic discounts on Cruise at the minute 10% discount plus 5% if you are a member of the Co-op
have just tried co-op they came out £50 cheaper than internet. portland came out £100 cheaper than internet.
I have a phone number for a fantastic agent for Portland holidays.She gave me the same price as if I had booked on line.She has worked for the Thomson group for years and certainly knows what she is talking about,unlike some who work in the high st agencies. PM me if you want her number
I don't know if this makes a difference to the price but Portland are now giving double discount in their sale until midnight on Monday.
http://www.portlandholidays.co.uk/?ito=3109&itc=januarysale
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