Covid-19, Quarantine and the 20 / 21 Season

Great point re issues when skiing across country borders.
There are a lot of issues (obviously) presently, which are leading me into "thinking the unthinkable" as regards writing off this coming season........

Well I have a holiday booked through Club Med for this season, last week in December, which I know there is no way on this planet that it will happen. Covid is going mad again, Switzerland has a high rate and things are only going to get worse as the winter goes by. I honestly cannot see any of us getting away this winter without booking our own travel and accepting any quarantine..... that's if we are even allowed to leave the country as things are heading down that route long term I am certain.

The question is: club med SURELY know this is the case, yet they're happily taking bookings for the season. At what point do they concede and inform me my holiday is cancelled, as obviously I won't cancel and lose money on it?
Wouldn't they gain more kudos from being up front with customers and saying they know it won't be happening and offering the option to cancel FOC, or take a credit voucher (not keen on the voucher option personally as we don't know when anything will change).
I am aware they're offering fee free amendments and rebooks but not cancellations.

Tone, I take your points entirely and think there is a lot of confusion and some more, potential restrictions ahead. However, Switzerland yesterday removed the requirement for UK travellers to quarantine on arrival (cue leap in EasyJet prices!). The quarantine period on return to the UK remains, however. I've opted for the DIY approach, with free cancellations/refunds on everything.

LOTA wrote:Tone, I take your points entirely and think there is a lot of confusion and some more, potential restrictions ahead. However, Switzerland yesterday removed the requirement for UK travellers to quarantine on arrival (cue leap in EasyJet prices!). The quarantine period on return to the UK remains, however. I've opted for the DIY approach, with free cancellations/refunds on everything.

I can live with quarantine as my current job is working from home. However in the current climate I'm not sure I want to share a hotel with people from Belgium, Czech Republic, France etc over a buffet JUST AS MUCH as they probably don't want to with an Englishman!

Club Med will have to rethink their whole operation from now on and I would be interested to hear how its going to work, and whether they reduce capacity in their hotels - if so, who misses out when they cancel a certain %?

Mate, I would be delighted to have a week skiing this season after the **** that 2020 has been, but I just have a feeling it will all be cancelled at some point....... at which time I will be packing up the E Class estate and heading east.......

The number of cases in Switzerland has increased dramatically in recent weeks. The overall prevalence of confirmed cases per 100,000 population over the last 14 days is 836.6. The prevalence is much higher in the French speaking cantons, in canton Valais it is currently 2083/100,00. In canton Grisons it is 'only' 495/100,00, which is slightly higher than the overall prevalence in the UK. If you want to keep up to date on the situation in canton Grisons checkout their COVID-19 dashboard https://ktgr.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/3984041586964ec88a8e9f8e76529cd5 St Moritz is in the Maloja region, it has a population of 18,259 and there are currently 63 cases.

If the latest measures introduced by the federal and cantonal authorities don't result in a significant fall in the numbers, I expect that local lockdowns will be imposed. There is little else that can be done to bring the numbers down.

Club Med will probably only cancel your holiday if government action forces them to do so, or if it is uneconomic to run it, as you might expect the TOs, hotels etc. have received far fewer bookings than normal. Even if it were to be cancelled it looks like it would be easier to get blood out of a stone than to get your money back. They seem to have a no refund policy.

I don't see what nationality has to do with it. All the countries you mention including the UK have a high prevalence of COVID-19, assuming the current measures remain in place you will be required to wear a mask in the hotel unless you are seated at a table (bar service is prohibited) or in your room. If anyone in the hotel tests positive during your stay the hotel will be closed and you will be put in to quarantine for 10 days. You can find details of the measures and ordinances in English here: https://www.bag.admin.ch/bag/en/home/krankheiten/ausbrueche-epidemien-pandemien/aktuelle-ausbrueche-epidemien/novel-cov/massnahmen-des-bundes.html#-1863604723 the English text has not yet been updated to include the measures introduced on 27.10. 2091

Why will Club Med "have to rethink their whole operation" they are owned by the Chinese company Fosun https://www.fosun.com/language/en/aboutus/1.html who probably have the resources to 'weather the storm', they recently relaunched Thomas Cook after buying the brand from the liquidator. Their CEO said "We are launching now clearly aware of the short-term challenges posed by the pandemic. We and our Fosun backers are taking the long view."

Like you all I really want to get skiing this winter if I can but I just can't see how unless things improve significantly across Europe. I'm in Dublin and we have been in restrictions that essentially mean lockdown for a while now and will be until December at the earliest. I've looked at all the options of booking myself, with a travel operator and even thought of driving from Roscoff but realistically I don't know how things will be in December or any other month yet.
Looking forward to my ski holidays keeps me going through the year, there really isn't a lot to look forward to at the moment unfortunately.

Austria is going into lockdown from midnight on Monday. The tourist industry will shut down until the end of November.
https://www.thelocal.at/20201031/austria-to-go-into-hard-new-lockdown-starting-tuesday

This is the compromise that regions will have had to make, otherwise the season gets written off and whole swathes of businesses reliant on skiing go to the wall.