Travel Changes?

[morgan98]

not to belabor the point… But just speaking for myself, France seems to be a real grey area. Not a definite ban on travel like Italy but also not as benign as the UK looks. New York Times says 200 cases in France today so it’s definitely going up. Anyway, I hope some clarity will come to this situation very soon!

I feel I have clarity - I am not going, at lest for now. I am interested in what my husband finds as a route for coming home sooner than planned.

 

[lovetotravel]

Thank you so much for posting this. We have international tickets with Delta, leaving in less than two weeks. Did you outright cancel your tickets? Or did you change them to future dates? I put a call in to Delta, but estimated call back time is 2 hours (which is fine - I can be patient!). I was going to go online to cancel, but it's still saying we will be charged $200 per ticket if we cancel. If we reschedule our trip, it won't be until March 2021 and they don't even have flights released for those dates yet, so I have nothing really to change our flights to at this time.

Call and do not do it online. I waited an hour before I got an agent. I outright cancelled the flight and gave COVID 19 as my reason. They said they are waiving change fees for international flight changes. My ticket is cancelled and the eticket number will serve as my credit. I have until 1 year from date of purchase, make sure you understand that because I had to think about it and ask for a clarification. Basically I bought my ticket in Sep 2019 for travel in March 2020. So I have until the date of my purchase Sep 2020 to use the credit. I have to call to use the credit when I figure out where I want to use it. The penalty will be waived when I make the new reservation and there is supposed to be a note on my eticket number that this was the cancellation agreement. If you get an agent that isn’t sure and won’t do it, call back or ask for a supervisor.

 

[disneyholic family]

Well, I am 99.9% positive I am not leaving for Italy as scheduled on the 12th. My flights was Atlanta - JFK - Milan and the JFK-Milan leg is actually an Alitalia flight (Delta code share) and it appears you can still book that ticket to Milan. I am sad but will call Delta when the wait isn't so long for a credit to be used in the next year. We travel to Italy often so that is fine.

My husband is currently in Italy - in Florence. He needs to take a test on Friday for a certification he has been studying for. He will be calling in the next couple of days to try to get home early next week. I am still not afraid of the virus, but with the restrictions and the screenings, I really don't want to be stuck, have to quarantine, etc. My company put out a message about limiting travel and self quarantining for 14 days if you travel to the impacted zones. While I could work from home for two weeks, I don't want to be THAT person. My husband, is retired with a hobby job so if he has to live in the basement by himself for two weeks that is not the end of the world. He wasn't supposed to come home until the 24th anyway.

I feel that the date of my travel being the 12th (next Thursday) is in what I would call the window of uncertainty, as we wait to see if Italy can successfully stabilize the situation over there are things start to heat up here. I feel that if I were going on April 12th instead, there may be a clearer path forward - although I know major airlines have cancelled flighst to Northern Italy until end of April. However, I would not be opposed to flying into a different airport.

But, Italy will be there and I will go as soon as I can. Good luck to everyone with the tough decisions.

ETA: I love Italy, my mom was born there, we speak the language, we have relatives, my husband has dual citizenship and we have spoken of potentially living there. A part of me hates to give up the trip because the economy there is so fragile and I sort of feel like I am throwing in the towel. But sometimes issues are bigger than you are, so to speak. Thanks for listening!

wise decision.
Every single case we have in my country (other than the diamond princess ones) are people who returned from Milan.
Milan is probably the worst place you could go right now other than China.
As you said, Italy's not going anywhere. You can go when the situation clarifies.

My sister's funeral is on Thursday (in the USA).
I have the tail end of bronchitis, so i probably shouldn't go for that reason alone.
But being in the high risk group, there is no way i'm traveling now.
Between airports and airplanes, the risk is just too high.
My sister will certainly forgive me.

.

 

[lovetotravel]

not to belabor the point… But just speaking for myself, France seems to be a real grey area. Not a definite ban on travel like Italy but also not as benign as the UK looks. New York Times says 200 cases in France today so it’s definitely going up. Anyway, I hope some clarity will come to this situation very soon!

Interesting question to ask ABD about the London trip ...Why did Disney cancel an event in the U.K. due to COVID 19 concerns?

https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/di...an-media-launch-event-coronavirus-1203522211/

 

[morgan98]

wise decision.
Every single case we have in my country (other than the diamond princess ones) are people who returned from Milan.
Milan is probably the worst place you could go right now other than China.
As you said, Italy's not going anywhere. You can go when the situation clarifies.

My sister's funeral is on Thursday (in the USA).
I have the tail end of bronchitis, so i probably shouldn't go for that reason alone.
But being in the high risk group, there is no way i'm traveling now.
Between airports and airplanes, the risk is just too high.
My sister will certainly forgive me.

.

Yes, but I was not going to stay in Milan at all. My husband is currently in Italy and has had absolutely zero issues and things are relatively normal. It is all just frustrating a bit.

Sorry to hear about your situation too - a vacation pales in comparison, but things are just very uncertain.

 

[neurosx1983]

Interesting question to ask ABD about the London trip ...Why did Disney cancel an event in the U.K. due to COVID 19 concerns?

https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/di...an-media-launch-event-coronavirus-1203522211/

Funny that they are concerned about the health of media execs but not ABD guests! OK that might be a bit harsh...

And on an annoying note, I'm getting frustrated with the 'vacationistas' who have become so unbelievably robotic with their responses. You can't get even a hint of a human response from them about this situation. They're literally reading from a script.

 

[disneyholic family]

Yes, but I was not going to stay in Milan at all. My husband is currently in Italy and has had absolutely zero issues and things are relatively normal. It is all just frustrating a bit.

Sorry to hear about your situation too - a vacation pales in comparison, but things are just very uncertain.

from everything the experts here are saying, anywhere in northern italy is going to be a problem.
it has blown way past containment there. It's raging out of control.
The danger is second only to china.
There's just no reason to risk it.
And what everyone is saying that "it's just a cold" is completely wrong.
All you have to do is look at a few xrays to see the extraordinary progression that can occur. Colds don't behave that way.
There's simply no reason to play with fire.
However, if you do go (as some here crazily insist on doing), you really should self-quarantine afterwards for 2 weeks.
Just because you want to put yourself at risk, doesn't mean you should put other people at risk as well.

.

 

[neurosx1983]

from everything the experts here are saying, anywhere in northern italy is going to be a problem.
it has blown way past containment there. It's raging out of control.
The danger is second only to china.
There's just no reason to risk it.
And what everyone is saying that "it's just a cold" is completely wrong.
All you have to do is look at a few xrays to see the extraordinary progression that can occur. Colds don't behave that way.
There's simply no reason to play with fire.
However, if you do go (as some here crazily insist on doing), you really should self-quarantine afterwards for 2 weeks.
Just because you want to put yourself at risk, doesn't mean you should put other people at risk as well.

.

I didn't even think it was a debate whether or not to go to Italy. CDC is saying DONT GO! In fact I think the white house put a travel ban on certain parts of Italy. It's probably a political decision not to make the entire country a travel ban....but given the number of cases there it should be.

 

[sayhello]

My sister's funeral is on Thursday (in the USA).
I have the tail end of bronchitis, so i probably shouldn't go for that reason alone.
But being in the high risk group, there is no way i'm traveling now.
Between airports and airplanes, the risk is just too high.
My sister will certainly forgive me.

I am so sorry for your loss!

And on an annoying note, I'm getting frustrated with the 'vacationistas' who have become so unbelievably robotic with their responses. You can't get even a hint of a human response from them about this situation. They're literally reading from a script.

Please be kind to your Vacationistas. They are only the messengers. I cannot IMAGINE what those poor people have been going through the last few weeks. They don't make policy, they don't decide when trips are cancelled, they are as much in the dark about this as we are. When they have information, they will give it to you. I wouldn't want to be them, or anyone in Travel Customer Service these days!

Sayhello

 

[KashasMom]

Taking a suggestion from the China changes thread, I thought I'd start one so people could talk about their upcoming travel and whether they're considering changing. As I said on the China thread, we have a Galapagos/Ecuador trip in July (another company) that I think we are going to cancel. Feels like a better year to explore somewhere we haven't been in the US.

We are also going to the Galapagos in July (another company) and no way I'm canceling unless something drastic happens between now and May when final payment is due. I'm not sure that I'd feel any more comfortable traveling in the U.S. (and I have no desire to go anywhere in the U.S.).

 

[Networth]

I am trying to decide wether to book our DLP portion after our Greece ABD. I would hope if something dramatic happens between now and the beginning/middle of May TWDC would provide refunds for any DLP packages booked. It’s the last large expense for our trip I have yet to book.

 

[AddictedtoTravel]

This is certainly a big boom for the travel insurance industry.

 

[sayhello]

This is certainly a big boom for the travel insurance industry.

Only if people a) have no clue what travel insurance covers or b) are willing to shell out for "Cancel for Any Reason" coverage. Most people are going to be sadly disappointed if they think their Trip Insurance is going to cover this. Most policies do NOT cover epidemics/pandemics.

Sayhello

 

[disneyholic family]

this is a fun website...
https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6
.

 

[BluesTraveler]

We are also going to the Galapagos in July (another company) and no way I'm canceling unless something drastic happens between now and May when final payment is due. I'm not sure that I'd feel any more comfortable traveling in the U.S. (and I have no desire to go anywhere in the U.S.).

Our final payment was due this week, so we felt like we had to make a decision. If final payment weren't due until May we wouldn't have made a change this early, but it was just a financial risk assessment (and Ecuador does now have the virus). Although we are disappointed not to go this year, we'll go another year. And, we got all of our $$ back, including our initial deposit and airfare. Happily there are lots of places in the US we are interested in visiting, so we've made alternative plans.

 

[neurosx1983]

We are also going to the Galapagos in July (another company) and no way I'm canceling unless something drastic happens between now and May when final payment is due. I'm not sure that I'd feel any more comfortable traveling in the U.S. (and I have no desire to go anywhere in the U.S.).

Incidentally the galapagos might be the safest place in the world for coronavirus...because of its isolation. Hence the whole reason Darwin found all those rare animals there?

 

[neurosx1983]

ABD finally sent me an email saying:

• Any guest or guide who has traveled from, to or through China, including Hong Kong and Macau, South Korea, Italy, Iran or Japan, within 14 days of their trip's departure will not be able to travel with Adventures by Disney.
• Any guest who has been in contact with someone from these areas, including guests with connecting flights in these locations, also will not be able to travel, nor will anyone who has helped care for someone suspected or diagnosed with coronavirus, or who is currently subject to health monitoring for possible exposure. Guests who have air travel booked through Adventures by Disney will automatically have their flights rebooked on an alternate route. Guests who booked their own air travel arrangements should contact their airlines directly to make the appropriate changes.

Seems like some obvious stuff...

 

[lovetotravel]

ABD finally sent me an email saying:

• Any guest or guide who has traveled from, to or through China, including Hong Kong and Macau, South Korea, Italy, Iran or Japan, within 14 days of their trip's departure will not be able to travel with Adventures by Disney.
• Any guest who has been in contact with someone from these areas, including guests with connecting flights in these locations, also will not be able to travel, nor will anyone who has helped care for someone suspected or diagnosed with coronavirus, or who is currently subject to health monitoring for possible exposure. Guests who have air travel booked through Adventures by Disney will automatically have their flights rebooked on an alternate route. Guests who booked their own air travel arrangements should contact their airlines directly to make the appropriate changes.

Seems like some obvious stuff...

Guess the trip is go then?

 

[AddictedtoTravel]

Only if people a) have no clue what travel insurance covers or b) are willing to shell out for "Cancel for Any Reason" coverage. Most people are going to be sadly disappointed if they think their Trip Insurance is going to cover this. Most policies do NOT cover epidemics/pandemics.

Sayhello

I guess I should have added this . I was being a bit snarky, guess it didn’t translate...

 

[Magnum_PI]

Yea, the vacationistas are almost certainly operating with *very* strict instructions to not deviate from that script in any way, shape, or form. I doubt they have much more information than we do, although I sympathize with wanting answers from Disney as an entity and not getting them. Ambiguity (especially in situations that feel high-stakes with health/large sums of money involved) really sucks.

@disneyholic family I am so sorry for your loss. And I agree that for sure your sister will forgive you for not traveling. She would probably tell you to stay home if she could!

@CaliforniaGirl09 Have a wonderful time, and let us know how you get on! I have a friend and co-worker heading out for London in a couple of days as well. Stay well!~