AtHomeWithGloriaHunnifordOctober2016 - 81

R I P O F F B R I TA I N ▲ Travelling solo With more than seven million* people living on their own and one in six** travelling solo, additional charges for going it alone on holiday aﬀect a large number of people. When widow Laurie Salsby decided to book a holiday with her two sons and their partners to mark the ﬁrst anniversary of her husband's death, she looked online and found a great package for the whole group. For two weeks at the Princess Golden Beach Hotel on the Greek island of Thassos, the price was £5,657. This included ﬂights, transport and twin rooms, which were the only type available. After booking, Laurie saw a detailed breakdown of the costs. It showed that the holiday total would have been £4,702.50 (£940.50 per person), but a supplementary charge of £954.50 had been added for Laurie because she was not part of a couple. After speaking to Thomson Holidays, Laurie found that she had no grounds for complaint as she had already paid the deposit and signed the terms and conditions. The company explained that the cost of the hotel makes up a signiﬁcant proportion of the total cost of the holiday, and Thomson Holidays' contract with the hotel operator required those costs to be charged on a per room basis. The company insists its holidays are always competitively priced and it oﬀers plenty of accommodation with single rooms, which are priced accordingly. HOW TO AVOID IT? Banking The latest series of Rip Oﬀ Britain exposes the scams designed to trick you out of your cash. These can be hard to spot but easy to fall for, and many start with a phone call that comes out of the blue. That is exactly what happened to 84-year-old Joyce Smith when she was tricked out of £90,000. After receiving a phone call during which she was told that fraudsters were working in her local banks, Joyce was then transferred to a person she was led to believe was Sergeant Jackson at Scotland Yard. 'I asked where he was speaking from and he said he belonged to the fraud squad. I didn't want to lose money, so I believed him,' explains Joyce. After telling her that the police had set up 'safe accounts' in her name to protect her money, 'Sergeant Jackson' gave Joyce account numbers and told her to go to the bank and transfer her money into the new accounts. He promised her that the money would be put back as soon as the so-called fraudsters were caught. Over three diﬀerent transactions, Joyce transferred a total of £90,000 without telling anyone, as she had been warned it could jeopardise the police investigation. Eventually, after worrying for some time, Joyce phoned Scotland Yard to speak to Sergeant Jackson, only to discover that he didn't exist. The police immediately opened an investigation and managed to retrieve £13,000 of Joyce's life savings. But this means the fraudsters have pocketed £77,000. As Joyce made the transaction herself, the banks are not obliged to refund her. FOR FREE AND After investigation, Rip Oﬀ Britain discovered that there is no legal limit on sole occupancy rates - companies can charge what they like. If you're not happy paying the extra charge then don't pay it. Start by comparing the prices of package holidays with the cost of booking everything separately yourself. By securing your ﬂight and accommodation IMPARTIAL FINANCIAL separately, for example, you can sometimes HOW TO AVOID IT ADVICE, VISIT - but not always - make great savings. As you get older, and particularly with WWW.MONEYADVICE If you decide to go with a well-known the onset of possible dementia, the SERVICE.ORG.UK tour operator, you will need to keep an only way to completely avoid scams eye out for single savers to get the best deal. is to set up a counter signatory for your Outside the summer holidays, there are times ﬁnancial decisions. This means that each of your throughout the year when companies do not transactions has to be signed oﬀ by a second person, charge single supplements. Make sure you book usually a relative, before it can be processed. But, these early as they get snapped up. this may take away some ﬁnancial independence. Cruises are a great option as some of the The police advise that you hang up the phone as larger companies oﬀer good sized cabins for soon as the caller asks for personal details. A police sole travellers. Some also oﬀer holidays without oﬃcer would never contact a member of the public the dreaded single supplement. asking them to transfer money. Knowledge base www.athomemagazine.co.uk NOVEMBER 2016 | 081 http://SERVICE.ORG.UK http://www.athomemagazine.co.uk

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