How to Protect Yourself by The Women’s Travel Group.
More than ever, we women travelers, need to protect our hard earned funds, set aside for travel. Here are some common scams/errors. I was caught in a few of these.
New documents for travel to the UK and EU. I applied on line for the UK Electronic Travel Authorization. One website says Official Site ETA but it is a visa service, another says Visa Application, also a private service. I hunted down the one that says gov.uk Arriving in London, there was no signage about it. Did I really need it? Answer is yes: safe not sorry. It took less than 10 minutes to fill out; the website I used clearly said it was a gov site. Lesson do not jump into filling something out. Check the site url and look to the bottom for more details. At the bottom of the official page is ‘Content’ proof this is a government website.
Travelers do not check actual website names. Recently we had an insurance claim, from a lady who went to Ixtapan with us. The woman bought what she thought, was our preferred insurance policy. Here is ours: https://www.travelinsured.com and here is something similar to what she bought. If you type in Travel Insured, you get a list which includes: Travel Insurance Quotes, Travel Insurance Center, etc. but these are NOT Travel Insured. How do you know? Look at the https:// part under the site. Beware: Companies routinely advertise under competitors’s names.
Passport renewal and visas. These applications need accuracyt. We recently had a traveler booked for Vietnam. Her completed visa looked good to us; we did not know she used information from her expired passport. She was rejected by the airline and called us hysterically. We scrambled to get her new visa from our Saigon partners; she was able to arrive a day late. I did something similar…. It is actually easy to mismanage passports. We all like to keep memories via old passports. I went to the airport with my old passport. Seeing the old friend in hand, I turned around, rushed back to Manhattan, made the plane but lost 10 years of my life. That oldie is now filed far away from travel supplies. You should clearly label the old one; that little punched hole on expired passports is not enough. Blue electrical tape on the oldie will warn you.
Money can go out of circulation while you have stored it at home. From time to time, countries create new currency. There is a period allowing converting old money into new. Recently I dug into my UK currency stash.. Not only was it not valid, but one had to have a bank account to exchange it. Lesson, when you depart from your trip, use left over currency for tips, small purchases or airport items before security. If it is torn or marked definitely spend it.
Countries change their currencies after economic crises. Some small countries adopt their larger neighbors’ money. Liechtenstein uses the Swiss Franc. Luxembourg changed to the Euro, but still accepts the Luxembourg Franc. Below is Wikipedia’s photos of old French Francs and New Euros. They are both pretty convincing. Coins are even harder to identify with their tiny engraved labels.
Money can be fake. So you are going to a new destination. Lets use our Paris Cruise, which is one of our upcoming trips. Bring along photos of the currency. Only exchange in hotels or in banks. The ATM is always your best bet. Change Bureaux are on every corner in tourist areas; they might be valid but their rates and fees are exorbitant. Worse is if you want a cross currency exchange; ie like giving up British Pounds for Euros?
You buy something large and it is being mailed to you. Here is the typical scam: you get something close to, but not exactly what you bought. My wooden Indian elephant has only one tusk! Or freight forwarding is not included. Lesson: photo your purchase from every angle. Include ‘freight forwarding’ which is the service that transports your item out of customs and into your home.
The Women’s Travel Group tries to head off scams and issues. And we solve them when we can. Contact us for any iffy situation related to our trips, insurance or other miscellaneous details. We have some room left on several late Spring and Summer trips. Call us 646 309 5607 or email us.
