On 20 January the British Foreign Office changed their travel advice to Nepal, and are now advising against all but essential travel to the country in the period leading up to the general election on 8th February.
We take the safety of our clients extremely seriously, and as such have cancelled trips to Nepal up until this date. Clients booked on affected trips will be contacted imminently with information and advice on their bookings.
The Foreign Office also states that they may extend this advice to dates beyond 8th February. At present we have not cancelled trips past this date, but will review the information available and make a decision whether to cancel any further trips, later this week, at which point any afected travellers will be contacted.
Should you have any questions, please contact our reservations team or online consultant
Kind Regards,
Robert
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
In the event that trips do get cancelled, what happens? Is the money refunded in full?? I ask because I may be affected if the advisory gets extended.
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
I would also like to know the situation with refunds.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is...
being a force majeure a refund will be given, but no compensation except for travel insurance and admin fees.
Thanks.
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
Hello everyone,
Thanks for your posts.
With regards to the refunding of money, it very much depends on the policy drawn up at the time for those departures affected.
At the moment, all clients travelling to Nepal on departures up until the 8th February have been contacted and offered a refund of the land arrangements.
Please note that some airlines may impose normal cancellation fees, but we will do all we can to assist those who have booked their flights through us, as will agents were involved.
We are expecting an update on the situation today and so I will keep you all posted.
I hope this helps and please do not hesitate in contacting me should you require further assistance.
Kind Regards,
Robert`
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
Hello, I was just wondering if the Nepal tours were still running now? The FCO does not seem to mention any warnings for Nepal, but the Australian government site still warns against non-essential travel.
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
Hi Hopeful,
All of our tours to Nepal are currently running but many of them have a slightly altered itinerary, using planes to get between towns and cities rather than buses.
This is to avoid the worst of the roads in Nepal and to ensure that the tours can still operate. The country remains a safe place to visit and local rebels have made it clear that they are in no way targetting tourists in Nepal.
Because of the current amendments there are small surcharges (payable locally) in place on some of our tours in Nepal. Full details can be viewed on our website.
We hope for the situation to return to normal at some point in the new year but do not know at the moment when that is likely to be.
I hope this helps.
Regards,
Brendan
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
Just wanting to know if this Info was for tours Beg 2006 or for 2007??????? The dates on forum are confusing to those travelling next year??????
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
Hi Joanne,
Thanks for your question.
The current situation in Nepal is as per my message from Yesterday. Every tour is running but there are amendments to most itineraries, with flights between the major towns and cities instead of road transport. Check at the bottom of the itinerary on the website for further details specific to the tour you are interested in and if you are not clear on anything drop us an email (online@imtrav.net) and we'll clear the situation up for you.
I hope this helps.
Regards,
Brendan.
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
I am quite disappointed to learn that I am the only person booked on this trip.
Before booking I checked the company's website and it stated that at least 6 people would be on any trip they ran out of Nepal. Furthermore, their website indicates that this is an "orange" trip with 5 or less spaces available -WHAT GIVES??
When I tried to book I was told that spaces where "limited" which implied that the trip was nearly fully booked. Then I was told I was "lucky" and you were able to confirm a space for me.
I'm out a considerable sum of money IN ADDITION to what I have paid you (visas, travel insurance, and airline cancellation fees).
Frankly, I have no desire to travel by myself which is why I booked with you in the first place. I realize travel in Nepal is dicey and wanted the safety in numbers travelling with a group provides
I guess their "Obsessed with quality" pitch is imaginary. A visit to their travel forum indicated that this last minute "notification" is how they run their business. See Jess's sad request below.....
Don Howard
Don Howard
URGENT! TOUR MATES NEEDED!!! RAJASTHAN EXPLORER AND BUDDHA TO BOLLYWOODopic: URGENT! TOUR MATES NEEDED!!! RAJASTHAN EXPLORER AND BUDDHA TO BOLLYWOOD
posted 25 July, 2006 11:21 PM
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Hello all, sorry for the shouty subject but I need to drum up some attention.
I'm booked on the combination tour from Buddha to Bollywood starting on Aug 20th and this meets up with the Rajasthan Explorer trip.
I've just heard from an Im. Trav rep that I'm the ONLY PERSON booked on this tour!!!!! And that only 7 others so far are joining us on the Rajasthan Explorer tour.
Please please please, anyone who is interested in a trip to India with a couple of days in Nepal then sign up!!! It's an AMAZING looking tour and there's plenty of space for all. We go to some beautiful places and ride down the river Ganges at dawn and even ride camels across the desert - WOW!
You might even be able to get some kind of discount (though don't quote me on that) as it's a tour that leaves next month.
Anyway, give it some thought and I promise to buy you a drink if you come!!!
Thanks for reading this - Jess xxx
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From: Carmel [mailto:Carmel@adventurecenter.com]
Sent: Tue 1/2/2007 4:55 PM
To: Donald G. Howard
Subject: RE: IMAGINATIVE TRAVELLER FROM BUDDHA TO BOLLYWOOD TRIP REF: HABB
Hi Don,
RE: IMAGINATIVE TRAVELLER FROM BUDDHA TO BOLLYWOOD TRIP REF: HABB - 21 January departure
Imaginative Traveller asked me to let you know that at the moment you are the only client booked on the above tour(plus the male tourleader) but from Day 7 to Day 19 you will be joined by at least eight clients booked on the Rajasthan Explorer tour 27January.
The Buddha to Bollywood tour on 21 January will operate as scheduled and is still open to bookings but Imaginative Traveller just asked me to advise you, out of courtesy, of the situation.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Kind Regards,
Carmel Moore
Adventure Center
1311 63rd Street, Ste 200
Emeryville CA 94608
USA
Phone: 1-800 227 8747 ext 213 or 510-654-1879 Ext. 213
Fax 510-654-4200
e-mail carmel@adventurecenter.com
[url=http://www.adventurecenter.com]www.adventurecenter.com[/url]
Adventure Center
Re: Vital Information regarding Nepal travel
Hi Don,
Thanks for your post and sorry that you feel let down by us.
On rare occasions unfortunately our tours do not achieve many bookings and out of courtesy we always advise travellers of these as soon as we can to let them know that there will not be a large group on their tour.
In these situations we are left with the unenviable task of either continuing to operate the tour with low numbers or to cancel the tour and offer an alternative or a refund. Because your tour 'shares' allocation (I will explain this below) with another tour in India we are able to continue to offer it even with just the 1 booking but sadly this means that there are no other travellers for you to travel with.
First of all, let me reassure you that Nepal remains a safe country to visit. We take the safety of our customers and local staff extremely seriously and would not offer tours to any destination that we did not deem safe. In reaching a decision we talk with our local staff, our regional office and the British Foreign Office. Although you will not be travelling in a group you will be with your own dedicated tour leader who will know the region well and who can advise you which areas are safe and which you should be slightly more cautious about.
I'm sorry that you were not notified sooner of the situation with your tour. There is a fine line between advising our clients as soon as possible whilst waiting to see if anybody else books. It it becoming more and more common for people to book long-haul trips last-minute and this in turn pushes back the time that we leave to notify clients if they are in a smaller than normal group.
I'm not sure where it states that a minimum of 6 people will be taking part in any tour out of Nepal? This is not normally the case, with I would say 95% of our tours being between 4 and 15/18 people. Please let me know where you read this and I will check it and amend this information as necessary.
Okay, so why did this happen? Without going into too much detail, some of our tours, including Form Buddha to Bollywood, share with another tour in the same region. Your tour shares with Rajasthan Explorer from days 7 to 19 and both tours combined have a total of 17 spaces. This is normally split with 8 spots allocated to your tour and 9 to Rajasthan Explorer. Our system automatically displays a tour as 'limited' when there are 5 or fewer spots remaining on a tour. So you are probably asking why your tour showed as limited when there should have been 7 places left? The reason for this is that we can manually 'steal' allocation from one tour and give it to the other tour. So on this date we have allocated some of your tour's 7 remaining spaces to Rajsthan Explorer, bringing it's total up and your tour's total down, meaning that your tour then had 5 or fewer places left and thus displayed as 'limited'.
As you have booked with Adventure Center in the US it is very important that you continue to discuss your booking directly with them. This is to ensure there are no discrepancies between their reservation system and our own. They have been in touch with our international reservation team and behind the scenes we are working on your booking and will get in touch with them again shortly.
I hope this helps to explain things a little more clearly. If yourself or anybody else has any further questions about this please feel free to raise them on this forum and I'll do all that I can to answer them.
Regards,
Brendan.