What to do when you need more than travel insurance
If you’ve shopped around for travel insurance, maybe you’ve stumbled across something that looks a lot like insurance, works a lot like insurance, but isn’t quite insurance.
Christopher Elliott
Hotels offer perks if you book direct. But should you?
Skip your travel agent and those comparison booking sites. That’s what more hotels want you to do, and they’re pulling out all the stops to persuade you to do it.
But should you?
Check out these sites for objective travel insurance information
Elaine Karlson is planning a vacation to Cooperstown, N.Y., to visit the National Baseball Hall of Fame and to watch her grandson compete in a baseball game. And she’s worried.
First, there’s the price difference between the refundable airline tickets and the nonrefundable ones — the refundable ones are three times as expensive. There’s also the question of what to do if she and her husband have to cancel.
Instead of paying extra for the less restricted ticket, she’s considering travel insurance.
Why Crested Butte is Colorado’s most serious ski resort
Crested Butte is Colorado’s most serious ski resort.
Seriously challenging, seriously scary — and seriously fun.
The mountain’s almost-vertical, double black diamond runs, most of them accessible from a T-bar lift, are in a class by themselves. (A T-bar? Haven’t seen one of those in years.) These slopes will put the fear of God in you even if you’re a lifelong skier.
WOW Air, where’s my compensation for that 14-hour delay?
After a 14-hour delay on WOW Air, Rachael Lopez thinks she’s entitled to some compensation. WOW disagrees. Who’s right?
Treated badly by the TSA? Get in line
TSA agents are getting ruder, and it’s time to do something about it. So say an increasing number of air travelers, citing their own experiences of being harassed and harangued by the screeners who are supposed to be helping them.
If Expedia says your return flight costs $1,668, believe it. Otherwise this could happen to you.
Johna Keen’s story of his return flight is a cautionary tale about ticket change fees and airline logic. But mostly, it shows that people don’t trust anything they see anymore, when it comes to travel. And that could be an even bigger problem.
A flag on the play after “free” NFL offer from DirecTV
Why is DirecTV offering — and then rescinding — Donavon Frater’s premium subscription TV package? The company doesn’t have a clue. Time to call for help.
Kicked off my cruise for peeing near the pool
When Karen Del Zoppo’s husband suffered a heart attack two years ago, he sustained severe anoxic brain damage, which left him with the mental state and motor skills of a two-year-old.
Del Zoppo didn’t want that to stop the family from enjoying a vacation. As a registered nurse, she’s more than capable of caring for her mentally handicapped husband. So she recently booked a getaway for the couple and her brother and sister-in-law — a western Mediterranean cruise that left from Venice, Italy.
Review this! Travelers fed up with solicitations
Is it my imagination, or are travel companies getting pushier?
The come-ons include repeated invitations to return to a hotel or restaurant, high-pressure pitches to “like” a company’s Facebook account and urgent requests for positive online reviews. As summer vacations fade into memory, the aggressiveness has never been more obvious.