Booking the flight and hotel separately is normally cheaper. What almost nobody prices in is the legal protection you give up doing it.
That protection has a name, the Package Travel Directive (EU) 2015/2302, implemented in the UK as the Package Travel and Linked Travel Arrangements Regulations 2018, and it is much stronger than most travellers realise.
What counts as a package
You have a package if you buy two or more different travel services for the same trip, combined by one trader. Transport, accommodation, car hire, or any other significant tourist service.
That can mean bought together from one seller, or bought separately from linked sellers within 24 hours where your details get passed along.
The 24 hour part matters more than it sounds. Booking a flight and then clicking through to a hotel on the same site can create a package, or sometimes a “linked travel arrangement” with weaker protection. The distinction changes your rights, so check which one you are actually buying. A trader has to tell you before you pay.
What a package gets you
One company is liable for everything
The organiser is responsible for every service in the package, whether they run it or not.
Hotel a building site? Transfer never arrived? Excursion cancelled? You go to the organiser. You do not chase four suppliers in three countries, and “that is the hotel’s problem” is not an answer available to them.
Booking separately, every failure is yours to chase individually, in the supplier’s jurisdiction, in their language.
Your money is protected if they go bust
Organisers have to provide insolvency protection covering refunds for services not performed, and repatriation where transport is included.
If a package operator collapses while you are abroad, you get flown home. If it collapses before you go, you get your money back. In the UK, ATOL does this for flight-inclusive packages.
Booking separately, an airline failure means your money is gone unless your card issuer or insurer steps in, and nobody is obliged to bring you home.
Price rises are capped at 8 percent
They can only raise the price at all if the contract says so, and then only for specific costs like fuel or exchange rates, and never within 20 days of departure.
Above 8 percent you can cancel and get a full refund within 14 days.
It works both ways. If those costs fall, you can claim a reduction.
Significant changes let you walk away
If the organiser materially changes the package, whether a different resort, a much worse hotel or a substantially different flight, you can accept it, take a replacement of equal or higher value, or cancel with a full refund within 14 days.
Extraordinary circumstances at the destination
If unavoidable and extraordinary circumstances at or near the destination significantly affect the package, such as a natural disaster, serious civil unrest or a major health emergency, you can cancel before departure without paying a cancellation fee.
Booking separately, you are at the mercy of each supplier’s own policy, which usually means a non-refundable flight and a hotel that keeps the deposit.
Help when you are stuck
Organisers have to provide assistance in difficulty: finding healthcare, dealing with local authorities, arranging alternatives. If you are stranded because of extraordinary circumstances they must cover accommodation, generally for up to three nights.
What you give up going DIY
| Package | DIY | |
|---|---|---|
| Who is liable when it goes wrong | One organiser | Each supplier separately |
| Money if the seller collapses | Protected, plus repatriation | Card or insurer only |
| Price increases | Capped at 8% | Not applicable, you already paid |
| Major change before travel | Cancel free | Supplier’s policy |
| Disaster at destination | Cancel free | Supplier’s policy |
| Stranded abroad | Assistance, up to 3 nights | Your problem |
| Typical cost | Higher | Lower |
So which should you book?
A package earns its premium when the trip is expensive enough that losing it hurts, and a cruise is the textbook case, when you are flying a smaller or financially shaky carrier, when the destination carries real disruption risk such as hurricane season or political instability, when it is a once-a-year trip you cannot repeat, or when the logistics are complex enough that one failure cascades into the rest.
Booking separately is fine when the trip is cheap enough to write off, when you are on a major carrier on a short simple route, when you have solid travel insurance and paid by credit card, or when you want specific hotels that no operator packages.
The middle path most people miss
Booking flight and hotel together on one site, in one transaction, often creates a package at close to DIY prices. The saving from unbundling is frequently smaller than people assume, and the protection gap is large.
Before you split a booking to save €40, work out what you are losing. On a €3,000 family holiday, €40 is a rounding error against repatriation cover.
Two things worth doing either way. Pay by credit card, because in the UK Section 75 makes the issuer jointly liable on transactions between £100 and £30,000, which is the closest thing DIY has to a safety net. And check what you are actually buying, since a linked travel arrangement gets you insolvency protection but not the full package rights. The seller has to tell you which it is, so read that box.
Frequently asked questions
Does this apply to business travel? Packages bought under a general business travel agreement are excluded. One-off business trips booked like any consumer are covered.
What about flight-only bookings? Not a package. You have EU261 or UK261 rights for disruption, but no insolvency protection.
Does it cover trips booked outside the EU or UK? The organiser has to be established in, or targeting, the EU or UK. A package from a US operator for a US trip is not covered.
Is a hotel plus airport transfer a package? Possibly, since that is two services sold together. It depends on whether the transfer counts as a significant part of the value.
Sources: Directive (EU) 2015/2302 on package travel and linked travel arrangements, the UK Package Travel and Linked Travel Arrangements Regulations 2018, and the Consumer Credit Act 1974 section 75.
Researched from primary sources and checked August 2026. General information, not legal advice.
Coastline photograph by Vyacheslav Argenberg, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
