Bloomberg Wealth: Travel Is Back, and There Are New Rules
A woman meditates, presumably trying to relax after spending a small fortune on her flight, on the sand at Matosinhos beach on the outskirts of Porto, Portugal.
Photographer: Eduardo Leal/BloombergTwo days. That’s how long an airline told me I’d have to wait to fly home after they cancelled my flight — giving me just five hours’ notice before I was due to check in. It was a Sunday afternoon in Porto, and as much as I loved the destination, I needed to be back at work the next morning.
I ended up paying about $200 for a hotel room in Porto on Sunday night, then $400 for a one-way ticket home on a “discount” airline; even in peak season, it used to cost about $50 in normal times. I made it to work on time on Monday morning, after waking up at 3 a.m. to catch my flight. (I didn’t actually tell my boss about this. He’ll find out when he reads this newsletter.) Will I get reimbursed for this trip by the airline? What about my travel insurance? Who knows. Hopefully.