The Government’s hotel quarantine booking portal is now live

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• J says:

  11 Feb11 February 21:51

  I’d like to visit friends and family in the UK – but I won’t because I would only endure this if it was some dire emergency – so in this respect for discouraging travel it works.

  • Super Secret Stuff says:

    11 Feb11 February 22:03

    Until summer comes around and you can wait 10 days on a beach in Spain 😂

  • marcw says:

    11 Feb11 February 22:18

    All these measures, including pre-departure testing, are there to discourage travel.

  • Joe says:

    11 Feb11 February 22:56

    You could always spend 10 days in 3rd country before travelling on.

  • Bazza says:

    12 Feb12 February 00:45

    With or without this you should not be visiting anyone! Has it not been made clear enough or are you one of the forever confused?

    • TGLoyalty says:

      12 Feb12 February 09:40

      I’m sure the OP didn’t mean RIGHT NOW

  • Track says:

    12 Feb12 February 10:34

    You know the attitude from Scotland: “do not travel here.”

• Anna says:

  11 Feb11 February 22:18

  It sounds similar to the 90s when we used to book holidays from Teletext and if you wanted it a few quid cheaper you opted for “allocation on arrival” where you didn’t actually know which hotel you were staying in until you got there! Our experiences ranged from pretty fabulous (4* All Inclusive in the Bahamas) to dismal (Half Board in Tunisia). You haven’t lived until you’ve flown to the Maldives with (now defunct) Air Tours, I can tell you 😂

  • bafan says:

    11 Feb11 February 22:36

    I’m 28, and I remember going to Florida on one of those when I was MAYBE 4 / 5 years old. It was a dire hotel though. I think we came back early because the ventilation system was giving my brother asthma attacks lol.

    • Lady London says:

      12 Feb12 February 12:23

      Yes. Lots of mold in Florida. Always seems like you have to choose between the smell of pool chemicals or mould in some of the hotels that turn out to be older.

  • Kevin C says:

    11 Feb11 February 23:57

    I had an allocation on arrival holiday where we were put up in a place attached to a petrol station in the outskirts of Faliraki. Didn’t do it again after that.

  • Yuff says:

    12 Feb12 February 07:50

    Only did it once in the early 90’s and did not enjoy the coach trip and people getting off in nice hotels, however landed on our feet in a nice 4* hotel in Limassol and it got even better when they were fully booked the 2nd week and said would you like to go to Ayia Napa in our sister hotel on full board( we were HB)
    We’d only paid £175 incl flights, didn’t tell guests in the 2nd hotel how much we’d paid when they said they were paying £2.5k each for the week…..😀

  • Cquadphil says:

    12 Feb12 February 21:11

    I remember in my twenty’s going for one to Crete. Arrived at night no idea, was a few days before we worked out what the town was even called. Had a great time though.

• Richard G says:

  11 Feb11 February 22:34

  I can’t wait to see pictures of the food…

  That aside, no way could I do this. Not being able to exercise properly for 10 days would ruin me mentally.

  • Bazza says:

    12 Feb12 February 00:47

    Clearly a man of very weak will power.

    • Chiba says:

      12 Feb12 February 07:14

      No, a man of human blood circulation

    • RajBad says:

      12 Feb12 February 08:48

      HAHA!

  • ChrisW says:

    12 Feb12 February 09:21

    By 5pm on Monday I predict Daily Mail will have pictures of the food with the first wave of complaints. Think about it – the hotel quarantine guests have nothing but time for 10 days. Plenty of opportunities to tweet images of depressing food.

    • Lady London says:

      12 Feb12 February 12:26

      And “my kid was assaulted because they couldn’t give us adjoining rooms”

      Cue massive expensive court case for compensation resulting in settlement from the public purse.

      The Daily Mirror awaits.

• Dr Lee says:

  12 Feb12 February 00:33

  And the legislation for this has yet to make an appearance!

  • Anna says:

    12 Feb12 February 09:29

    I’m wondering if they’ll use current isolation/quarantine regulations as these already cover hotels. It’s well established that they can’t lock people in rooms or even prevent them leaving the hotels so there’d be no point in legislating for that.

• coolguycp1 says:

  12 Feb12 February 07:07

  Still confused about the rules in Scotland, if I travel to a non-red international destination from a Scotland airport for an essential reason and fly back to Scotland via LHR, do I have to quarantine at home (in Scotland) or will I be asked to quarantine in the hotel as soon as I reach Scotland?

  • BP says:

    12 Feb12 February 11:02

    Hotel quarantine in Scotland. Book seperate flights or travel to Scotland by train and you can likely bypass the control completely.

    • kitten says:

      12 Feb12 February 12:27

      quarantine for non-red?

      • Colin MacKinnon says:

        12 Feb12 February 15:03

        Yep.

        The theory goes: we have mutations, and with some of them the vaccine may not work.

        If we let everyone in, the standard ubiquitous strain – which the vaccine can handle – might not be the Kent one, which has replaced the Chinese one.

        If a potent strain comes in from overseas, and starts to get established, we may not find it in amongst all the infection we currently have. Think: you can’t spot a new tree in a forest.

        If, with the vaccine, we can drive the current infection rate right down, then any new “tree” will be standing in a desert! So it can be easily spotted. As has happened in Melbourne.

        Even if that “tree” is a self-mutation, like the Kent one was.

        So Nicola wants to plan ahead, whereas Boris is reacting – late – to circumstances.

• KKC says:

  12 Feb12 February 08:26

  Whilst it’s obvious a certain percentage of the ‘profit’ will have to go toward paying for security, testing etc, I suspect that a good percentage of the excess funds will go to the company that built the website and, quite possibly, will get a commission for every booking. I wonder if we’ll ever learn who got the contract, what they’re earning from it and what their ‘relationship’ with Government is! Of course, the web site is still not live and is still showing the same banner as yesterday claiming it will be online “later today” ….!

  • SG says:

    12 Feb12 February 08:50

    Accommodation is booked through through a travel management firm, CTM North, based in Bradford. They are providing the booking portal that still doesn’t work on the Friday before the first Britannia inmates, sorry travellers, arrive on Monday.

  • kitten says:

    12 Feb12 February 12:29

    Ah, but at least they can say they “launched it” even if the website is still not functional.

• Neil Spellings says:

  12 Feb12 February 09:08

  What other “ports of entry” like ferry ports, Eurostar etc? One could easily have travelled to a red zone country then hop over the channel that way.

  Will ferry companies start checking original departure points? Or will Border Force start checking everyone(or a sample) and start issuing the fines then bussing people to airport quarantine hotels?

  • Olly says:

    12 Feb12 February 09:56

    I don’t think it will be fines for people caught circumventing the rules. “Go to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect two hundred. See you in a decade” If they’re not seen to come down hard, certain type of people will be on to it, including a few from here by the looks of it. But mainly YouTube influencers and the like in the news recently, who by their very nature might influence others to do it.

    • Anna says:

      12 Feb12 February 10:28

      Former DPP Keir Starmer doesn’t agree with you, publicly stated that it’s unlikely anyone would get prison time for breaching any of this. Also sentencing is down to the courts, not the government. I’m not condoning rule-breaking, just being realistic.

  • meta says:

    12 Feb12 February 09:57

    The onus is on carrier to check. There will be fines for airlines and other transport companies if someone is found out to be in breach.

• L Allen says:

  12 Feb12 February 09:36

  Being taken back to the airport you arrived at could prove very annoying, especially if the designated hotel is actually closer to your home. I’d rather pay for a taxi from the hotel than sell a kidney to pay for any taxi based at an airport.

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