BOOKING CONDITIONS

Please read these thoroughly before booking: We are members of the Travel Trust Association (TTA - ref: U2501), providing you complete financial protection. Our flights sales are protected by ATOL - ref:T7132 or sold on behalf of an ATOL protected supplier.

BOOKING:
Bookings will only be confirmed when a completed and signed booking form has been returned to Travel Action with the full balance for the holiday. The booking form must be signed by the first named person on the booking and by signing confirms all persons on that booking agree and are bound to these booking conditions.

Once we have received all outstanding payments and the signed booking form, we will confirm your holiday in writing. Confirmation at this stage is still subject to availability of products and services. Please check your invoice as soon as you receive it for any errors as it may not be possible to make changes at a later date. Travel Action cannot accept any liability if we are not notified of any inaccuracies within fourteen days of issue, or five days for airline tickets.

PAYMENT:
A deposit per person is required to confirm and hold any ground arrangements. If paying within 8 weeks of travel then the full balance of the holiday is required. Any deposits for airline tickets will be separate and may vary depending on the flight purchased. Any insurance policies purchased must be purchased at time of full payment (please note – full travel insurance is mandatory).
Deposits and payments for products sold on behalf of a 3rd party supplier may be different. Any variations in payment procedure,deposits and cancellation conditions will be advised at time of initial booking.

The full balance for the holiday and insurance premiums must be received by us no less than 8 weeks prior to travel. This date will clearly be shown on the initial deposit invoice, although we will not send out any reminders. If this payment is not received by this time we reserve the right to treat your booking as unwanted and cancel. In this case cancellation charges apply, see cancellations. Minimum deposit non-refundable.

All cheques should be made out to Travel Action Trustee account and forwarded to Payments, Suite 7, 18-20 Stanford Ave, Brighton, BN1 6AA.

All payments and will be placed in a Trust account, until such time as you have recieved a confirmed booking from a 3rd party ATOL protected supplier or until you have returned from your Travel Action holiday, when the funds will be released from the Trust account. This keeps all monies paid by the customer safe in case of solvency of our company.

CONTRACT:
A binding contract between us comes into existence when we despatch our confirmation invoice to you after full payment. This contract and all matters arising out of it are governed by English law. We both agree that any dispute, claim or other matter which arises out of or in connection with this contract or your holiday will be dealt with by the Courts of England and Wales only. COSTS:
We reserve the right to increase or decrease the prices of unsold holidays at any time. The price of your chosen holiday will be confirmed at the time of booking.

Once the price of your chosen holiday has been confirmed at the time of booking then, subject to the correction of errors, we will only increase the price in the following circumstances. Price increases after booking will be passed on by way of a surcharge. A surcharge will be payable if transportation costs and/or dues, taxes or fees payable for services such as embarkation or disembarkation fees at ports or airports increase or our costs increase as a result of any adverse changes in the exchange rates which have been used to calculate the cost of your holiday.

We promise not to levy a surcharge within 30 days of departure. * Due to the above promises, no refunds can be made in the event of favourable exchange rate variations or decreases in costs.

We reserve the right to correct errors in both advertised and confirmed prices. We will do so as soon as we become aware of the error. Please note, changes and errors occasionally occur. You must check the price of your chosen holiday at the time of booking.

CHANGES & CANCELLATION BY YOU:
Should you wish to make any changes to your confirmed holiday, you must notify us in writing as soon as possible. Whilst we will endeavour to assist, we cannot guarantee we will be able to meet any such requests. Where we can, an amendment fee of £20 per person/per booking will be payable together with any costs incurred by ourselves and any costs or charges incurred or imposed by any of our suppliers.

Should you or any member of your party need to cancel your chosen holiday once it has been confirmed, the party leader must immediately advise us in writing. Your notice of cancellation will only be effective when it is received in writing by us at our offices. As we incur costs from the time we confirm your booking and may be unable to re-sell your holiday, the following cancellation charges will be payable. Where the cancellation charge is shown as a percentage, this is calculated on the basis of the total cost payable by the person(s) cancelling excluding insurance premiums and any amendment / cancellation charges which have already been incurred. Insurance premiums and amendment / cancellation charges are not refundable in the event of the person(s) to whom they apply cancelling. Air tickets are subject to separate cancellation charges set out by our flight agents. These cancellation charges will be noted on your invoice. Over 42 days – loss of deposit , Over 30 days – 40% , 15 - 30 days - 75% , 14 days or less – 100% Depending on the reason for cancellation, you may be able to reclaim these cancellation charges (less any applicable excess) under the terms of your insurance policy. Claims must be made directly to the insurance company concerned.

Please note the cancellation conditions do not apply to any insurance policies taken out by us as they are always non-refundable.

If any persons on a group or multi- person booking are prevented from travelling and they wish to transfer their place to someone else, they can do so as long as we are notified no less than 14 days prior to travel. A £20 amendment fee will be charged. This applies to ground only, arrangements, Air tickets will be subject to the conditions of the flight booked and Airlines may charge a levy for changing. Please note, airlines rarely allow name changes, in this case a new air ticket must be purchased and any refunds collected for the original ticket from the airline.

Any products sold by Travel Action on behalf of a 3rd party will be subject to their cancellation conditions, of which will be advised at time of initial booking.

CHANGE & CANCELLATION S BY US:
Occasionally, we have to make changes to and correct errors in brochure and other details both before and after bookings have been confirmed and cancel confirmed bookings. These changes and cancellations are very rare, although we must reserve the right to do so. However, we promise we will only cancel your confirmed booking 8 weeks or less before departure where you have failed to comply with any requirement of these booking conditions entitling us to cancel (such as paying on time) or where we are forced to do so as a result of circumstances outside our control/“force majeure” as defined later in the conditions. We will not cancel after this date for any other reason.

Most changes are minor. Occasionally, we have to make a major change. Major changes made before departure, are; a change to a lower standard or change in location of your accomodation for the whole or a major part of the time you are away, a change in departure or return date of your trip, a change in duration of your trip or any significant change in the activity portion of your holiday.
Please note, due to the nature of air travel, flight times are subject to change. In the event of flight times changing, we will inform you immediately. Travel Action is not liable for any inconvenience caused by flight times changing.
If we have to make a significant change or cancel, we will tell you as soon as possible. If there is time to do so before departure, we will offer you the choice of the following options:-

You can accept the changes, purchase an alternative holiday from our Travel Action, if the cost of the new package is less any outstanding monies will be refunded. If the new package is more expensive we will ask for you to make up the difference. You also have the option to cancel in full, whereupon a full refund will be dispatched to you.

In all cases, our liability for significant changes and cancellations is limited to offering you the above mentioned options and, where applicable, compensation payments (for package cancellations within six weeks - £20 per person). We regret we cannot pay any expenses, costs or losses incurred by you as a result of any change or cancellation. No compensation is payable for minor changes or where we make a significant change or cancel more than six weeks before departure.

Very rarely, we may be forced by “force majeure” to change or terminate your holiday after departure but before the scheduled end of your time away. This is extremely unlikely but if this situation does occur, we regret we will be unable to make any refunds (unless we obtain any refunds from our suppliers), pay you any compensation or meet any costs or expenses you incur as a result. Force majeure, means any event which we or the supplier of the service(s) in question could not, even with all due care, foresee or avoid. Such events may include war or threat of war, riot, civil strife, terrorist activity or actual threatened terrorist activity, industrial dispute, natural or nuclear disaster, adverse weather conditions, fire and all similar events outside our control.

Activity - Sometimes activities cannot be completed, due to weather conditions. if this is the case you will be refunded for the activity cost of the holiday only. If you have completed part of a course you will recieve a refund that reflects this and be part refunded.

LIABILITY:
Except where otherwise expressly stated in these booking conditions, we regret we cannot accept liability or pay any compensation where the performance or prompt performance of our contractual obligations is prevented or affected by you, someone in your party or any third party unconnected to with Travel Action or any of our suppliers that we could not have predicted or avoided. This also includes anyone not carrying out work for us in particular or general at any time. We also cannot be liable for any event or circumstance which we or our suppliers could not have predicted or avoided after taking reasonable care.

We will also not be liable for any injury, illness, death, loss of enjoyment, damage, expense, cost or any other sum or claim of any description affected by the above reasons. In some cases, the suppliers we use require a liability disclaimer form to be signed by you. Travel action will inform you fully where this is the case, before booking. The insurance policy will/should cover you for any injury acquired during any activities undertaken (see INSURANCE below).

We will not be responsible where you do not enjoy your holiday or suffer any problems because of a reason you did not tell us about when you booked your holiday or where any problems you suffer did not result from any breach of our contract or other fault of ourselves or, where we were responsible for them, our suppliers or agents or where any losses, expenses, costs or other sum you have suffered relate to any business. Please advise us of any medical problems before booking.
All our suppliers comply with the laws and regulations of the country they operate in. If any complaints arise regarding the provision of services, these local laws and regulations will be used as a basis to decide if the services have been properly provided, not the laws and regulations of the UK. This does not include the absence of any safety features that should be provided and result in the customer refusing that service.

YOUR RESPONSIBILTY:
Your booking is accepted on the understanding that you realise and accept the risks and hazards potentially involved in activity holidays and that you are mentally and physically capable of undertaking your chosen trip. You must tell us if you have an existing medical condition or disability that might affect your holiday before you book the holiday. If, in our reasonable opinion, your chosen holiday is not suitable for your medical condition or disability we reserve the right to refuse your booking. We reserve the right to cancel the contract if medical problems are discovered, in this eventuality we will give a full refund but no compensation. You are responsible for bringing with you the proper clothing and equipment, which we advise you about in our printed trip information and pre-departure information pack.

Many of the services which make up your holiday are provided by independent suppliers. Those suppliers provide these services in accordance with their own terms and conditions. Some of these terms and conditions may limit or exclude the supplier’s liability to you, usually in accordance with applicable International Conventions. Copies of the relevant parts of these terms and conditions are available on request from ourselves or the supplier concerned. All our dive operators require a medical form to be completed before any diving by uncertified divers (students) will take place. In most cases this will be dealt with in the UK by us.
Visa & Passports.You must check any visa requirements for the destination of your trip. ravel Action will assist where possible and advise, although we cannot be held responsible for customers visa or passport issues. Please contact the Foreign office or the relevant Embassy for details. Make sure your passport is valid for your trip.

INSURANCE:
Adequate and appropriate travel insurance is mandatory for travelling with Travel Action. Details of the policy we offer are shown elsewhere in this brochure. If you decide not to purchase this insurance, you must give details of your alternative policy (insurer and policy number) on our booking form. As a minimum this Insurance must provide the same level of cover as that as is offered by Travel Action. If you fail to do so, we will add the appropriate premiums for the personal travel insurance we offer to your confirmation invoice. These premiums must be paid as soon as possible as cover will not be effective until we receive all applicable premiums in full.

Please read your policy details carefully and take them with you on holiday. It is your responsibility to ensure that the insurance cover you purchase is adequate for your particular needs. We do not check alternative insurance policies.

PROBLEMS & COMPLAINTS:
If you have a problem during your holiday, you must inform your local contact for that service or hotel. If your complaint is not resolved locally, please contact our office in the UK by email, fax or phone (we will reimburse any costs) immediately. We will try our best to resolve the problem while you are there. If you remain dissatisfied please put your complaint in writing within 28 days and send to our office.

You must communicate any complaint to your tour leader/instructor or hotel without delay and complete a report form whilst on the tour. If you fail to follow this simple procedure we will have been deprived of the opportunity to investigate and rectify your complaint during your holiday and this may affect your rights under this contract.

PASSPORT, VISAS AND HEALTH:
Although we can advise you on passport, visa and health requirements, this advice is a guideline only. All responsibility for these issues is with the traveller and we can accept no responsibility or liability.

FLIGHTS:
Our flights are booked through an independent agent. This agent is fully ATOL bonded. All payments for flights will go direct to this agent and not Travel Action as we just act as a reservation agent for the ATOL holder. Your flight contract therefore will be with the ATOL holder not with Travel Action, we just act as a reservation agent for the ATOL holder.

The flight times given to you are subject to change as is the aircraft. Any changes in flight times will be advised immediately.