Ed Leigh's COVID Saving Snow Tips | Ep 43 | Accommodation

Catered chalet holidays are going to be tricky this year, Crystal has canned their whole chalet operation and are just promoting hotels and self-catering apartments. And while I have heard from some indy chalet operators that they will be running catered chalets for different household groups with social distancing and mask wearing in communal areas, which is presently allowed in France for up to 10 people but wouldn’t be under UK guidance, many of the operators I’ve spoken to expect demand to be low. I’m not sure I would risk the catered option unless you can book the whole place out.

As for self-catered chalets more generally, the uncertainty does mean there are some insane deals floating around for the accommodation they are doing. 

Here is a link to some Ski World deals: https://www.skiworld.co.uk/ski-deals/franceAnd SunWeb who are offering a cash refund guarantee on top of their Covid measures: https://www.sunweb.co.uk/

And here’s Crystal’s best deals: https://www.crystalski.co.uk/ski-deals/…

Of course, triple check the Corona t’s and c’s this winter if you’re booking a package. You want ATOL and ABTA protection in case your holiday company goes bust, and flexible Covid policies that allow you to cancel or amend or postpone your trip if you have symptoms or have been told to self-isolate or are in a local lockdown. Most tour operators are all over this as are loads of independent chalets, like More Mountain in Morzine https://www.moremountain.com/moreflex/

Chalet Chardons in Tignes https://www.chaletchardons.com/…/ski-safe-with…/

Though as I’ve mentioned before, please check the government FCO advice before you book https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice

and if travel to a country is not advised (as it is for most places right now, until they sort the airport testing out) it doesn’t make sense to book right now. Also beware, if the government advice changes to one country eg France but another is still open eg Italy, most tour operators will reroute you, you’ll still get a snow holiday but perhaps not where you planned. Something to be aware of.

Doing things independently makes good sense too. You can plan last minute depending on the foreign office advice, but if you use an indy rental platform such as Airbnb or HomeAway just again triple check those terms. Airbnb for example will let a guest or host cancel if they actually have Covid but won’t let you cancel if your travel is disrupted OR if government or local restrictions are in place, so that’s a big gamble given what’s been happening in the last few weeks. Their latest Covid advice is here: https://www.airbnb.co.uk/…/answers-for-travelers-about… They have introduced a mechanism that lets you search for properties with flexible booking, so look out for that and read more about it here: https://www.airbnb.co.uk/…/how-were-helping-travelers…

HomeAway are encouraging owners to offer amends or refunds but you’re slightly at the mercy of the person you booked with. My advice, if you really want to provisionally book something now, is to open up a conversation with the owner. In most cases people are being pretty reasonable or offering a refundable deposit up until December when things should be a little clearer one way or another.

Booking directly with a resort’s tourist office is another good plan, as in France at least, a lot of resorts are allowing last minute cancellations due to Covid. These include Serre Chevalier (open the page in Chrome for easy translation) up to one day in advance: https://reservation.serre-chevalier.com/…/annulation… Les Menuires (up to a week in advance) https://lesmenuires.com/en/cancel-at-no-cost…

Val d’Arly: https://www.valdarly-montblanc.com/ and more. I will talk more about the best resorts (including those who are stepping up the most regarding Covid) next week.

And with all this uncertainty, hiring your skis and snowboard from Intersport makes good sense as along with whopping discounts this winter (up to 50% in some cases), they are also offering full refunds up to the day before you’re due to hire https://www.intersport-rent.fr/ It’s worth mentioning they refunded all their customers last winter too when Covid cut the season short. These are companies to trust and support this winter in my opinion. Cheers all!