Level 3 Travel Warning issued for Italy

If travelers cancel on their own, they will have to individually absorb the costs or, if they bought insurance thru RS, they will receive a credit toward future RS travel within a certain period of time - I believe 15 months. On the other hand, if RS cancels, they have to offer refunds. Is RS waiting until the last minute to cancel trips, expecting that most worried travelers will not wish to wait until the last minute and will cancel on their own? This would limit the amount of refunds RS needs to offer when it eventually cancels the trips.

If you don't have Cancel for Any Reason insurance, chances are you will not get a refund as most insurances don't cover pandemics. Why cancel before the very last minute if you are not going to get a refund???

One reason for non-insured travelers with RS to cancel, I believe, is that if they cancel prior to 14 days from departure they will get a 50% refund ( forfeiting 50% as a cancellation fee). So, in the absence of hard information from RS, when approaching the two week point prior to a tour, non-insured travelers who do not wish to travel because of the virus situation will have to face the question of whether to chose a 50% refund (and pay the 50% cancellation fee) or to wait and take the chance for a possible full refund if RS cancels the trip. I would guess that many would opt for the 50% "bird in the hand."

This is incorrect information....look under Money Matters. There is a chart that shows that cancellations with fewer that 30 days remaining are charged 100% of amount as a fee. If you cancel 66 to 30 days before, you get are charged 50% as a fee. It is not clear if this includes airfare ordered through them. That may be forfeited totally. Please be careful about giving people incorrect information that may cost them money down the line.

This is incorrect information....look under Money Matters. There is a chart that shows that cancellations with fewer that 30 days remaining are charged 100% of amount as a fee. If you cancel 66 to 30 days before, you get are charged 50% as a fee. It is not clear if this includes airfare ordered through them. That may be forfeited totally. Please be careful about giving people incorrect information that may cost them money down the line.

A note on airfare, that refund is based on what the airlines charge. Right now, many major airlines are refunding tickets due to the global situation (Delta, United). Lufthansa has a 24 hour cancellation policy. Assuming that is correct (and there may be information I am missing), when cancelling 30 days before your program should result in a refund of 1/2 the fee for the program and your airfare. Cancelling with less than 30 days before your program should result in your airfare returned but no refund of you program fee. My guess is that the reason they only look a month ahead is that they will owe fewer refunds if cancelling the program since some folks will call "chicken" and cancel to save at least half the fare!