What our Booking Terms say
Cancellation policies and penalties are set out in detail in the trip itinerary (e-brochure) as well as the tour confirmation provided to you.
Need to talk to a trip specialist? Submit an inquiry.
Deposits
An initial deposit is required immediately upon booking to make your reservation. Depending on the nature of the tour, additional deposits may be collected subsequent to the Initial Deposit as they may be required by cruise, airline or other travel partners pursuant to our contract with them.
Final Payment
Failure to make the final payment by the due date may result in cancellation of your booking and forfeiture of any applicable deposits.
Cancellations and Refunds
In the event of a cancellation by one guest in a double occupancy room, the other guest shall be responsible for the payment of the single supplement applicable at the time of booking.
All bookings are subject to a non-refundable Reservation Management Fee of 2.4%. This fee represents the immediate administrative costs incurred by W&A for professional planning, supplier coordination, and secure transaction processing. In the event of a refund, this fee is retained as compensation for services already rendered at the time of booking.
No refunds will be made for unused services once travel arrangements have commenced.
Cancellations and deviations may arise as a result of a Force Majeure event (as defined below). In booking a trip, you acknowledge that such cancellations and deviations are beyond our control and that compensation for monies paid may take the form of a travel credit toward an alternate booking date or alternative travel services in accordance with TICO regulations, rather than a cash refund. The specific remedy available will depend on the circumstances and on the recoverability of funds from our travel suppliers.
Airline Tickets
We request that you not book any tickets or make any non-refundable air reservation prior to receiving the go-ahead from our office that the particular trip you have booked is guaranteed to be operated. Most of our programs have a minimum number of participants which we must achieve in order for them to be carried out feasibly. If you book your air tickets prior to receiving such notification from us, then you absolve W&A from all liability for air cancellation penalties if the trip does not go ahead.
Full Booking Terms are agreed to at the time of booking, and may include more details for your specific trip that are not on this page.
How your money is handled
Wheel & Anchor through its affiliate, New Sky Travel, is a TICO‑registered travel retailer, that’s the Travel Industry Council of Ontario for those outside the province. TICO has strict rules about consumer protection, particularly around trust accounts. In practice, this means:
- Every payment from members goes into a separate trust account.
- Funds can only come out of that trust account to pay for actual travel services: ships, hotels, transport, guides, etc.
- We are legally precluded from using that money for salaries, rent, software subscriptions, or any other business operations.
Why cancellation fees exist
In reality, what people call “penalties” are:
- The non‑refundable or partially refundable amounts we have already paid out to suppliers.
- The structural risk of operating small, high‑touch, small‑group trips.
- The revenue we lose when a late cancellation pushes a trip below viability or erodes the margin that keeps the company afloat.
Cancellation insurance
This is, again, where trip cancellation insurance becomes critical. It’s the bridge between our need for firm commitments and your need for flexibility if circumstances genuinely change. Not ideal, not free, but far better than a system built on tentative maybes.