hi there i was wondering if i have a claim i went on holiday to Fuerteventura on the 19th of march and had to return home 3 days later due to lack of comunication with the travel agents and the hotel. i suffer from celiac disease and need all my food to be gluten free and when i booked my hoiday i said to the travel agents that i need the hotel to cater for me and he said that would not be a problem he sent the hotel an email saying to them and they came back saying that would be ok so when i arrived on the resort and went to have something to eat there was nothing that i could eat at all as the chips had a coating on them the rices all had gravies throught them and the salad had pasta though it and i was unable to eat any on that so i went to speak to the rep to see if he could help me out by saying to the cheif that there was nothing that i could eat and see i he could do me a dish with stuff on it that i would be able to eat and he said that the meals they do are all done at the one time.
so i was just wondering do you think i have a claim this is just a breif description of it.
thanks Leeann
Did you book this holiday as a package ie flights and accommodation? Was anything written on your invoice as a special request?
Tour ops T&Cs usually have a line that says Special Requests can't be guaranteed. What you need is the reply email that says this one can. Armed with that you ought to have a case for breach of contract, without it things may get messy.
That said, from reading your post it seems the travel agent passed on your request to the hotel - could you not have shown the reply to the email to the hotel management and sort resolution that way if indeed the hotel had said that they could cater to your special needs? I'm really surprised that some meals could not be prepared for you, or for some food on the buffet not to be suitable for you. What about salads, soups etc?
As steve8482 says - they may just say it is a special request and that these requests are not guaranteed.
Not meaning to derisive in any way------------But surely you could have found something to eat
Have you never been on package holiday in a hotel before?
Sorry if I cannot sympathise but I feel you are trying to blame someone else for your problem.
Booking a package holiday will limit what food is available. It is mass catering and difficult if not impossible to cater on an individual basis.
My eldest son is a chef and whilst he will try he is not always able to cater for specific dietary needs.
fwh
My guess is though that they will turn around and say there was food on the menu that you could have ate!
i have to agree, there must have been something you could have eaten even if the choice wasnt great, i used to work as a cook in a nursing home and 1 of the patients was on a gluten free diet and he could eat some of the normal food other patients had, but it was mainly wheat products that was the problems, so he had his own, pasta, bread, cereals etc
A lot of it also depends on the type of package booked. Was it All Inclusive, Full Board, Half Board or B&B/Room Only?
I think we need a bit more information than you have given us.
It does seem a bit drastic to fly home after 3 days because of the hotel food. What sort of complaint did you make in resort with regards to your promised special diet?
See, if there was no paperwork filled in whilst in resort then the TO might well say that you just didnt like the food and decided to go home.
I've never been in a hotel in Spain that doesn't put plain lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, carrot and cheese on the buffet"¦.followed by some sort of fresh fruit.
Bread, salad and fish are the staple diet of the Spanish and they eat platefuls of salad piled high.
I appreciate that you wouldn't be able to eat the bread, but to say there was nothing to eat at all, is a little hard for me to grasp, what is wrong with bacon, eggs and fresh tomatoes for breakfast or the cheese and ham that they usually provide for the continentals.?
Maybe when the hotel said they would cater for your diet, they probably looked at their menu and though, well if she can't eat one dish, she can always have a fresh cheese or ham salad that night.
Many diabetics who control their diabetes by eating a controlled diet, they seem to be able to go abroad and find something to eat, and some take their own diabetic jam and marmalade for their breakfast.
The worst scenario....you could have gone to a restaurant and ordered a salad , it's not what you would like, but rather than come home, you could have saved the receipts and then taken up your complaint.
Photographic evidence also comes in useful at times.
Sorry this may not be what you want to hear, but unless you have it in writing and can prove that there was no alternative"¦then I think you haven't got a leg to stand on.
Sanji
a bit more info is needed, were you on all inc or half board. i hope that you have everything in writing, keep us posted
Senor Beaver
I think that is an important factor - what board was booked? Until that information is provided we're all making assumptions. Any advice given on this complaint is going to differ on whether it was an AI hotel or a hotel booked on RO.
Whilst you may request food for special dietary need most of these places are simple not set up that way.
The Chef (who is probably more like a catering manager) will supervise a staff producing dishes to a menu prepared by him.
fwh
Having catered for hundreds of people in the UK and overseas, as long as we had notice it really isnt hard. I know some people take advantage of this, but having informed them way in advance they have can have no excuse.
But IF it was booked on a RO basis, would there be a contractual basis for the hotel to provide such meals?
If it was RO then the complaint wouldnt hold any water
Having gone on rather, I do think Leehan has a point, if reassured before going that gluten free meals were guaranteed, when in fact they weren't, if it's in writing surely there is a case to be answered. Food related conditions shouldn't be trivialised and dismissed.
Good luck, I think in part this comes down to a lack of understanding of the condition.
Pam
Whilst discussion of celiac disease may be interesting, it perhaps is best that we wait for answers from the OP on questions asked previously in this topic.
MarkJ HT Mod
If the poster was told by the TO that they would get their request then they should get their request, regardless of any other matter that has been posted about chefs, amount of guests, etc!
That is the point here!
If the hotel couldn't provide this then don't tell the customers you can!
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