The ‘stay-cation’ set to be a thing of the past with 41% of Brits* bucking the trend in October alone

With the doors being closed on our disappointing UK summer and early predictions pointing to yet another chilly winter with temperatures hitting an icy average of 3.7 degrees**, more and more consumers are making the last-minute dash overseas in search of some winter sun.

New travel site, hotelly.com, has already seen a significant increase in Brits desperate to escape the impending winter blues with 41% of users opting to fly off into the sun-set already this month.

“In the past few weeks, our site has seen a large amount of users searching for pre-Christmas beach holidays. This is a direct result of Brits taking a ‘stay-cation’ in the summer and, quite frankly, being let down by the weather. For a lot of people, it was a lousy summer and they want to make up for it now,” said Vishal Jain, Director at Hotelly.com. “It’s no surprise that people are snapping up these best value deals to winter sun locations – we expect this to continue well into the New Year.”

According to Hotelly.com, the top five destinations booked in October are

• Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt
• Tenerife, Canary Islands
• Goa, India
• Lanzarote, Canary Islands
• Dalaman, Turkey

Top five tips to ensure you get the best value for your winter get-away

1. Research your holidays online but always call to book
- Your computer can’t negotiate discounts!

2. Make sure you shop around – the average consumer looks at 23 sites before booking their holiday and spends an average of 46 hours researching holidays
- Even easier, let a comparison site do all the work for you

3. Always beware of the total booking price being different to the original one quoted
- A lot of sites don’t include add-ons at the outset including baggage, check-in, credit card fees, online check-in

4. Don’t trust star ratings. These are given when hotels are opened and can be up to 10 years out of date. You need to research the latest user reviews
- Look at comments, videos, images – not just the glossy hotel brochures that say they’re great

5. In terms of insurance, ensure you ask for supplier failure cover as opposed to ATOL as the former gives you the replacement cost of a flight, not just what you paid
- When an airline goes bust, competitors automatically hike prices by up to hundreds of pounds for immediate departures to those destinations served

These tips are brought to you by Hotelly.com.