Will the Foreign Office advice invalidate insurance for my trip to Uzbekistan?
Simon Calder answers your questions on trips to central Asia, passport renewals and frequent flyer schemes
Q I am planning a trip to Samarkand and Bukhara in Uzbekistan in March. But I am confused by the Foreign Office advice which, as I read it, could invalidate my insurance. It appears that these two cities are safe but some border areas are not. Could you confirm whether my trip will be covered, please?
Peter S
A You raise an important point: a traveller who visits a destination to which the Foreign Office advises against going is likely to find their travel insurance no longer applies. Standard policies contain an exclusion against paying out if you have a mishap somewhere that the UK government believes you should not be. (It is worth pointing out, though, that during the Covid pandemic, when the Foreign Office ludicrously insisted that Portugal was as risky as parts of Kabul, a number of insurers started offering “travel against FCDO advice” policies at competitive prices.)
Another effect of the Foreign Office advising against travel is that mainstream tour operators (holiday organisers) will not send passengers to such a destination, and will make arrangements to repatriate anyone who is there.
My lengthy prologue is to show how important it is to know exactly what the FCDO is saying. The current advice for Uzbekistan has been in force since August. It cautions against visiting the nation’s borders with Afghanistan and Tajikistan but stops well short of warning against travel. The most strident warning is: “Terrorists are likely to try to carry out attacks in Uzbekistan.” Personally, I worry much more about the dismal driving standards on the roads of Uzbekistan.
As things stand, you can expect to be fully covered next March. You will be travelling to two of the most glorious locations in central Asia. Samarkand is astonishing in the scale and glory of its Islamic monuments, but I find Bukhara even more enticing. You might want to visit the excellent Silk Roads exhibition at the British Museum before departure. And, if you possibly can, make time for the capital Tashkent and dreamy Khiva – one of my favourite places in the world.
Q My passport expires in July 2025. Is the Passport Office doing renewals quickly these days? If not, when is the best time? I intend to go to Europe before March.
Annie C
A Thank you for a timely question. First, the fact that your passport expires in July of next year makes me concerned that it may already be too old for a trip to Europe. This is one of many effects of Brexit on existing British passports. Your travel document would have been issued at some date between October 2014 and July 2015; before the UK voted to leave the European Union, renewed passports were routinely credited with up to nine months of unexpired time from the old document.
While we were in the EU, having a passport valid for up to 10 years and nine months was no problem; you could use the document up to its expiry date. But after the Brexit vote the United Kingdom asked to be a “third country” in the eyes of the European Union, which means we are subject to two rules on passport validity: no older than 10 years on the day of entry to the EU; at least three months remaining on the intended day of departure.
If your passport was issued on 24 November 2014 or earlier, it is no longer valid for travel to Europe. Conversely, if the document was issued with exactly 10 years’ validity, your trip to the EU in March is covered because the passport will not reach the “three months left” point until some date in April.
Having said all that, late November is an excellent time to renew your passport. I am hearing excellent accounts from people who this month have either renewed online (my preferred method) or used the Post Office “check and send” service. While HM Passport Office says you should allow three weeks, I predict your replacement will be safely with you within 10 days.
The next surge in passport applications, which will slow things down a little, will be shortly before Christmas when prospective yuletide travellers check their documents and discover they need to renew; and another bump in early January among people who have just booked summer holidays.
Q I know you write a fair amount about frequent flyer schemes, but do you actually belong to many of them? If you do, which do you regard as the best one?
Jody T
A The only frequent flyer scheme of which I am an active member is Avios – the reward scheme operated by IAG, which includes British Airways, Iberia and Aer Lingus. That is because there is a vast array of award opportunities. Most of them are on BA itself, but the currency is also used by Finnair and Qatar Airways.
Almost all of my redemptions are for short-notice, short-haul flights: in my experience, this is when passengers can get maximum value-per-point because often availability comes up shortly before departure at a time when fares are extremely high.
An example: next month I am going to eastern Germany and then travelling west. While I have booked a Ryanair flight from Stansted to Leipzig, I prefer to stay flexible about when and where I return from. Years of almost entirely favourable use of Avios points for short-notice flights indicates that I will almost certainly be able to source a flight from Basel in Switzerland to London Heathrow for the cash equivalent of around £80 (valuing each point at 1p).
I have not looked at the cash fares on British Airways or easyJet because I have confidence. This might, of course, unravel, in which case I can head along to Geneva – where there are so many flights that I have always managed to get on board.
My other use for Avios is for one-way tickets to the US, when (for example) I know I will be returning on a route from, say, Halifax in Canada, from which BA does not fly. Almost all of the Avios I accrue are from spending with an American Express card rather than flying – if, like me, you always buy the cheapest cash ticket, you will earn precious few frequent flyer points for flying frequently.
I have an account with Miles & More (Lufthansa) and Virgin Atlantic, but these are strictly passive – I belong to them because they have mild benefits even if you are not an avid collector, such as free inflight wifi. My other sort of loyalty scheme is easyJet Plus. I pay around £200 annually for a range of benefits including free cabin baggage and free seat selection. I calculate that after eight easyJet flights, I am “in profit”.
It sometimes makes me choose easyJet over other airlines, too, which I guess is the point. Finally, I asked Michael O’Leary, chief executive of Ryanair, why he did not reward me for flying frequently with his airline. He insisted he does, through constantly low fares.
Email your questions to s@hols.tv or tweet @SimonCalder
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