This could be YOU!

Have you seen the new Tenerife Magazine yet? It is FAB! Being 100% virtual, I can’t say it has hit the streets running but the very first issue comes with a brilliant competition giveaway – a holiday for up to four at the gorgeous Sands Beach in Lanzarote!

All you need to do to enter is become a fan of the Tenerife Magazine page on Facebook. The draw is to be held on November 30th and results will be announced via Facebook.

It is hard cheddar if you are not on Facebook, I am afraid but not to worry. I have it on good authority that the next competition will be run through a different medium – maybe Twitter.  Perhaps the next competition will even be for a Tenerife related prize?

Hopefully this is not too late to help some people who have booked their holiday through the now defunct Xcapewithus and are struggling to get their money back.

Xcape seems not to have bothered informing half of their clientele who unfortunately arrived at various foreign destinations unaware that  paid holiday bookings made through Xcape had been cancelled. Those who found themselves on foreign soil were forced to pay the full rate for their hotels again.  To make matters worse, Xcape continued to collect money via their website until the last second.

Given the activity on the Xcapewithus threads on Tenerife Tattle a lot of people were affected and visitors are still landing on the blog using search terms related to the whole Xcape debacle.

If the Xcape situation has affected you then this long and informative thread on Money Saving Expert on Xcapewithus should be of interest. It includes links to authoritative articles from newsapers and seems to have led to quite a few people recovering money they had thought was gone for good whether they paid for their holiday with credit or debit card.

Costa Del Silencio is only 10 minutes from Reina Sofia airport in Tenerife South, sitting together with Las Galletas on the coastal corner of on the island before it tips up towards Los Cristianos and Las Americas and on to Los Gigantes on the southwest.

The whole small town has been receiving a bit of a face lift recently with footpaths widened and upgraded and a new one way road system. The new pavements are roomy and pleasant – a vast improvement on the narrow and bumpy kerbside trails that made walking from the Hermusa supermarket down to Las Galletas an ankle-breaking adventure rather than a gentle promenade.

Work has been completed in the stretch of Avenida Jose Antonio Tavio much to the relief of shop and bar-owners in the Chapparal and Tre Bol complexes and also from Ten Bel up Calle Diana as far as Maravilla and Desimar while it has just begun in the area of De La Te just past Club Marino and on past Alondras Park to Coral Mar.

Over the next few months I’d be recommending holiday makers look towards the self catering and hotel complexes of Palia Don Jose and Palia Don Pedro as well as Eureka and Maravilla as these properties are in locations where work is completed or not likely to start for the forseeable future.

Alborada is no longer a tourist option as it has turned 100% residential and discourages holiday letting.

There have been quite a few comments and questions from people who have booked their holidays through Xcapewithus. Xcape themselves have made the following announcement:

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
Please contact your accommodation provider directly to check that your booking will still be honoured by sending an email to customersupport@xcapewithus.com

PAYMENT BY CREDIT CARD or VISA DEBIT:
If the provider confirms that the booking will not be honoured, and your booking was made with a Mastercard or Visa credit card or a Visa Debit card, you will need to contact your card issuer for a refund. Please note that your card issuer will require proof that the booking will not be honoured.

PAYMENT BY DEBIT CARD or BANK TRANSFER:
If you have paid by Maestro, Switch, Solo or bank transfer we suggest that you check your travel insurance policy to see if you can make a claim.

If you are unable to reclaim your money through your travel insurance then please send an email to claims@xcapewithus.com (with the subject line: ‘Xcape With Us Claim’), please include your reference number. There is little likelihood of there being sufficient funds to enable these claims to be met.

In addition to the above, the comment copied below was posted by Jenny in the Xcape Goes Bust thread:

A word of advice – Xcape used various agencies (in Mallorca at any rate) to make their hotel bookings (such as Serhs and Hotelbeds) and they cancel direct with the hotel. Therefore the hotel cancel the booking, so please use the channels on the Xcape website, as otherwise you may turn up at your hotel to find there is no room. The hotels DO NOT get paid in advance (only after the holiday, sometimes as much as 3 months after) by the agents, and therefore they have no obligation to honour your booking. Sorry to disappoint but I work in reservations in a hotel, and know that we have had direct cancellations from agencies for bookings made originally with Xcape, and we have no way of informing a client as we don’t have their details.  CHECK FIRST is all the advice I can offer

Read the rest of the comments in the thread – Xcape Goes Bust

Online holiday supplier Xcape With Us has gone belly up. With no forewarning for website publishers to remove their banners and ads, they just ceased trading and sent out the announcement about it today. I wonder at what point they stopped taking bookings because I know I was informed of bookings made just last week.

If you visit their website you will see the following message:

We regret to inform you that XcapeWithUs.com has ceased trading as of 30 April 2009.

If you have a confirmed booking and we have your email address you will receive an email shortly explaining what steps you can take.

If your arrival date is 30 April 2009 or 1 May 2009 please email: customersupport@xcapewithus.com with full contact details including your reference number.

At the moment I have no further information but would presume that holiday makers should be able to continue with their plans by contacting Xcape through the channels specified above.

Whether or not affiliates who in good faith helped this company accept holiday bookings will receive their commission is another story.

On visits to Tenerife to enjoy some ‘winterless sun’, Sir Peter Stothard, Editor of the Times Literary Supplement, watched the gradual development of the Sentido San Blas Reserva Ambiental and did not know what to expect from this latest addition to Tenerife’s glitzy array of five star hotels and tourist properties.

Today, in an article in the Times Online, he shares his opinion of the new hotel and pulls no punches about what he thinks of Tenerife’s lack of historical identity.

You could soon be checking out your next holiday to Tenerife along with your week’s shopping. The Aldi travel site goes live on January 8th and they promise to keep holiday prices as low as they keep their supermarket stock.

At a quoted price of just £6.50 per night for a Tenerife holiday it looks like the chain will be giving both traditional high street travel agents and online booking services a run for the money.

That is all good. The more choices we have to vote with our feet the more realistic the big companies are forced to keep their prices.

Checkout Aldi travel deals in the story published recently in the Guardian.