Claire Schoeder, a travel consultant at Century Travel in Atlanta, already is fielding phone calls from clients about travel to the United Kingdom in the wake of the Brexit vote.
Some already have booked and paid for trips. Others want to know whether they should consider travel across the pond.
The main questions center around how far U.S. travelers’ money will go with the British pound having fallen, and should they try to cancel and rebook at hotels where they already have paid.
“I told them it’s a wait-and-see thing,” Schoeder, who plans to go to London in a couple of weeks for business, said Friday. “Just based on these initial reactions, the markets are very volatile. It’s all over the map right now, but as long as the pound stays down, it will certainly be less expensive.”
As far as rebooking, she doesn’t see the benefit right now.
“Those who have prepaid generally will not get any benefit from the lower rate of exchange, as any refund would be at the current rate of exchange and not at the one they paid.”
Some consumers are scrambling to see what effect the U.K.’s decision to leave the European Union will have on travel, and how soon, but travel agent Dan Tagariello said he hasn’t had any calls about the Brexit. He thinks people want to wait and see how “it washes out. The dollar is still worth less than the British pound. Next week, this could all even out again.”
Tagariello, a partner with Buckhead Travel Partners in Mableton, said the uncertainty probably wouldn’t affect his mostly business clientele.
“People who do corporate travel are going to go anyway,” he said.
Jonathan Grella, executive vice president of public affairs for the U.S. Travel Association, said there are two sides to the issue that are important to consumers.
Obviously, for those who are eyeing a trip to the U.K., “now may not be a bad time due to the strengthening of the dollar versus the pound,” he said. “But what remains to be seen is how long there will be this imbalance between the two.”
Unlike the immediacy of a natural disaster, a health concern or a security issue, the British exit from the EU may take years to occur.
“It won’t be sudden or as dramatic,” he said. “It remains to be seen how long this impact will matter.”
Jeremy Pilmore-Bedford, British consul general in Atlanta, said in a statement that “it is important to understand that — as the (prime minister of Britain) has said — there will be no immediate changes, in the circumstances of British citizens living in the EU, nor for European citizens in the U.K., nor in the way our people can travel, in the way our goods can move or the way our services can be sold.”
In the 12 months leading up to April, the number of visits to the U.K. was 5 percent higher than the same period a year earlier. The number of visitors who came from North America rose by 11 percent and jumped 4 percent from Europe, the Times reported, citing the Office of National Statistics in the U.K.
For now, "with a significantly improved exchange rate, Britain is effectively on sale, giving American tourists a fantastic opportunity to visit this historically expensive country on the cheap," ThePointsGuy.com Editor-in-chief Zach Honig told the Huffington Post.
Because of that, vacationers traveling to the U.K. this summer likely will get more bang for their buck.
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