4 ways Covid-19 has changed the way I'll travel in future

During my lifetime, nothing has been as disruptive on our daily lives as the Covid-19 crisis. As a global pandemic, at some point, every citizen on earth will be faced with some change (albeit temporary) to the way they live their lives. It's been huge, unnerving and destabilising - and travel, and more broadly the hospitality industry has been one of the first and so far hardest hit.

But how the various travel businesses have reacted, and the responsibility different businesses have taken is considerable - and how travel agents, airlines, hotel chains and every other travel and tourism related business has treated their customers is likely to change the way consumers plan and pay for travel in future. As someone who flies a lot, with a considerable number of trips cancelled, here is my own experience, and how I will change my behaviour going forward.

Be selective on hotel chains, flexible versus inflexible: With hotel chains in many countries forced to shut entirely, travellers have been forced to cancel bookings. Where I'd booked a more expensive but flexible booking, I was reassured to be able to change the date or cancel without penalty. However, as with many travellers, I had a number of non-refundable pre-paid bookings. Large chains have been very flexible, refunding even non-refundable bookings. But regional and mid-range chains have been less accommodating. Whilst one chain of hotels waived normal terms and conditions to offer changes or refunds, both Nordic-based hotel chains offered little in the way of service - either stay on the date you booked (even when all flights to the destination are cancelled, making a stay impossible) or contact your insurance. If you offer to allow me to change the date, unless I know when the health crisis will end, how can I re-book?

My advice: Stick with hotel chains who showed flexibility, avoid pre-paid and non-refundable rates where you can.

Avoid using too many companies when booking a trip: As a frequent flyer, I enjoyed the challenge of creating complex trips with multiple stopovers in different countries, mixing airlines, hotels and travel agents. In this way, it may have created a large number of bookings to track, but it got the most flexibility and the best prices. When you try to manage cancellation of a trip (for example, over Easter, I was supposed to be in Svalbard), I now need to liaise with 2 airlines for 6 flights, 4 different hotel bookings and three different travel agents. Was the saving I made worth the hassle of trying to get money back after everything is cancelled? No! It's not to say that I wouldn't booking flights and hotels separately, but I'll be a lot more mindful about how many businesses I book with for a single trip.

It may sound crazy, but it's even worth considering more complex routing to stick with more reliable airlines - it may add an extra leg to a journey, but it will keep your whole trip protected under a single trip reference.

My advice: avoid booking a trip with too many businesses, because cancelling or changing is harder when multiple companies are involved!

Avoid Online Travel Agents (OTA): Some of my trips have been booked directly with the airline or the hotel chain, others have been booked via online travel agents (OTAs). OTAs advertise cheap prices that quite often beat the cost of booking directly, but other than price, they add little value to the traveller's plans. Most will try to maximise revenue by charging extra fees that you don't need to pay, like "lost baggage services" or charging double the cost for checked baggage than booking directly with the airline or even fabricated charges that are utterly unnecessary , such as paying to receive a text notification of your booking or paying extra to have better customer service.

I certainly regret all my bookings made with OTAs - after they have taken my money, trying to get through to outsourced offshore call centres to get money back on cancelled flights is taking weeks longer than where I booked a flight with the airline directly. In short, for me, OTAs add no value or security in booking and create extra risk if you need to get your money back. And when you do get through to the OTA's outsourced service provider, the experience will invariably be sub-par compared to airlines and hotel chain internal support functions. In one protracted and painful online chat experience trying to get a refunded on cancelled flights with MyTrip, the agent insisted on calling me "Sir Murphy" throughout the conversation, telling me that this was the correct way to address customers! Equally, as an Expedia Gold customer, when I cancelled a fully refundable hotel stay, the travel agency charged me TWICE for the same cancelled refundable reservation and now can't be reached due to Covid-19 volumes - not the best advertisement for their "premium service".

My advice: Don't rely on OTAs to book trips, book directly with airlines and hotels.

Accept that sometimes the unexpected can occur: At the end of the day, whilst I love travelling, exploring new places and sitting on planes, there is a bigger consideration. My health, and the health of those all around me trumps any yearning to fly off abroad. It's been a nightmare unpicking my travel plans for the next two months, but I, like everyone else, have realised that in the bigger picture, it doesn't really matter. Some trips are planned far in advance, others are last minute getaways, but no trip is ever more important than our own health and safety. So going forward, I'm learning to look forward to any trip, feel excited about a new destination, but equally accept, that should circumstances change and the trip get cancelled, it was only a luxury item, unnecessary to my life and happiness. Hopefully there will be another chance to visit Svalbard again, see family in Lisbon and head back to Bordeaux. Right now, following WHO and government advice to stay at home feels a whole lot more important.

My advice: Only book a trip if you are prepared to write off if circumstances change.