Easyjet and Easyjet Holidays has updated its Protection Promise ahead of the hoped-for resumption of international flights from next month.
The carrier said that “With international travel set to relaunch from the UK on May 17 with a traffic light system in place, the airline believes that it will be safe for most European destinations to be placed in the low-risk green list based on successful vaccine roll out programmes”.
But it added that “given the potential for changing restrictions, customers will be provided with more booking flexibility than ever before to ensure they can change their bookings if they need to”.
The government has yet to confirm when international travel can resume, stating only that May 17 will be the earliest possible date. Further details are expected to be announced in early May.
The enhanced policy means that customers will be able to change their flights this summer without fee, up to two hours before departure, regardless of the destination. Flights can be changed to any services currently on sale up to the end of September 2022.
Changes can also be made fee free to Easyjet Holidays packages, up to 28 days before departure, and the carrier said that “Holidays will be regularly reviewed on a rolling basis throughout this summer within weeks of their scheduled departure once more is known about the frequency of the UK government reviews of the lists”.
The Protection Promise also guarantees that customers whose trips are impacted by a mandatory hotel quarantine, or a lockdown travel ban, will be able to receive a refund for their flights, even if they are still operating. The refund can be requested within four weeks before departure if the restriction is still in place.
For flights to destinations placed on the “amber” list, customer will be able to make fee free changes or cancel their holidays for credit up to 24 hours before travel, and for any destinations added to the “red” list, Easyjet will cancel any holidays no later than seven days before travel and customers will receive a full refund.
The carrier noted that “should the UK government make any short notice changes or additions to the red list within seven days of travel, Easyjet Holidays will unfortunately have to cancel these bookings and customers will be refunded in full”.
The changes to the Protection Promise will remain in place for travel up to September 30, 2021.
Commenting on the news Johan Lundgren, CEO of Easyjet, said:
“We know that people want to travel to see friends and family or to go on a long-awaited holiday but that flexibility continues to be crucial for our customers, so we’ve made our Protection Promise across flights and holidays even more flexible to help customers navigate travel restrictions this summer.
“Offering more flexibility than ever before means that more Brits can make plans to travel without having to worry about incurring change fees or the expenses of mandatory restrictions, should their trip be impacted.
“We also know that our customers need clarity to be able to make plans and so urge the UK government to provide final details of the testing regime and let the public know the categories countries will be placed into as soon as possible. We believe that safe travel should be possible between the UK and most European countries and so see no reason why most wouldn’t be placed in the green list.
“Customer health and safety remains our absolute priority and we strongly believe that with vaccination, travel to low-risk government approved destinations should not be placed prohibitively out of reach by costly PCR testing so we hope the Government will make good on its promise to bring the cost of testing down so travelling to safe green-light destinations is affordable and possible for all.”
In the last month Easyjet has announced a raft of new services for this summer, including Gatwick-Newquay, and five new routes from Birmingham airport to Mallorca, Malaga, Alicante, Faro and Corfu.
Easyjet to launch five new routes from Birmingham this summer
