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Travel companies targeted in campaign to expose shoddy service and dodgy deals
The travel industry is being singled out by a Which? campaign to uncover "shoddy practices" and stop the "dodgy deals".
The consumer group is asking holidaymakers to tell them about their biggest holiday gripes and will use these complaints to identify "repeat offenders".
Guilty travel companies will then be contacted and challenged to put things right.
If they don’t comply, Which? said the action will be escalated to the appropriate authority, whether it’s health and safety officials, trading standards or another body.
"People don’t deserve to come back from holiday as stressed out as when they left. This summer, we’re asking travellers to share their getaway gripes so we can expose the dodgy deals and shoddy service to stop the holiday hassles," said executive director Richard Lloyd.
The ‘Stop the Holiday Hassles’ campaign comes after Which? research found 15% of Brits who have been on holiday in the last two years experienced a problem, which equates to more than six million people.
Of those people who said they’d experienced a problem, the most common issue was delays or cancellations to flights (30%), a long wait to reclaim baggage (25%), accommodation being different to the description (24%) and unhelpful or rude staff (24%).
Two in 10 travellers (21%) said they once had a holiday that was so bad they felt like they needed another one.
Nearly two thirds (64%) who have taken a holiday in the last two years said if something goes wrong they will usually make a complaint.
But only half (54%) said they feel confident that they know their rights if something goes wrong.
As part of its campaign, Which? will also provide holidaymakers with travel tips and advice about what they are entitled to.
Which? said although it often receives complaints from consumers about their holidays, this is the first time it has launched a targeted campaign to "get to the bottom of it".
Its research was based on a survey of 2,079 UK adults online between July 2-3 2014.
Of these, 1,408 people had taken a holiday in the UK in the last two years and 1,165 people had taken a holiday abroad in the last two years.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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