Remember life before kids?
If you and your other half wanted to get away for a week or two, it was as simple as picking a destination, finding the cheapest time to go, booking time off work, and packing your suitcase.
But with kids?
You need to navigate term time vs non-term time. School fines for unauthorised absences. All the extra luggage you need to pack, carry, and pay extra for. Not to mention extras like pushchairs for smaller children. That’s before we have considered the extra cost of a place on the plane for your little ones and potentially the extra charge to have them at the hotel.
Well, Jet2holidays make all of this a little bit easier with their Free Child Places offer – and it’s a good ‘un.
This deal is aimed squarely at families, and can bring the cost of a holiday down by 25% or even more if things fall in your favour. It essentially brings down the cost to pre-kids levels.
Here is how it works.
Millions of Free Places Available
Although the Free Child Places deal operates on a first come first served basis – so when they are gone they are gone – there are millions of free places available every year.
So while they don’t all disappear in the first few weeks, you might find availability is better at some times, and to some destinations, than others.
To book a holiday with a free kids place, you simply search the holidays as normal and the site will add the free places based on the ages you input of the people travelling.
For example, here, I searched holidays for 2 Adults and 2 Children, giving the children’s ages as 6 and under 2:
The site is now showing me the cost with the free places offer included, as you can see from the image. You can narrow down your search by using the filtering options if you only want to see places with a children’s club, or a splash park, or a gym, etc.
So it’s incredibly easy to find a holiday and see what it is going to cost upfront. No adding discount codes later on or messing about with extras that haven’t been included yet.
Speaking of what’s included, the free kids places are made up of the following:
- Free seat on the plane
- Free accommodation
- Free transfers
- Free piece of checked baggage
- Free food and drink if you have booked all inclusive
- Free kids clubs at the hotel (where included)
It goes without saying that all these holidays are also ATOL protected.
It’s also worth knowing that you can get one free child for every two full price paying adults. So four adults travelling with two children could potentially get both kids holidaying for free. For groups such as parents, kids and grandparents, or parents, kids, plus auntie and uncle, this is an epic saving.
I say ‘potentially’ because only one free child is allowed per room. So it would depend on the specifics of your booking.
A final note on age limits. The free places are age restricted but it is the hotel, not Jet2holidays, that set the upper age limit. It’s between 11 and 17 in most places, but do check. Importantly, your child must be within the age limit on the date of the return flight to qualify.
Available Year Round
This isn’t a seasonal offer either. Jet2 aren’t just trying to fill space during their quieter periods. Their free child places are available all year round.
Any season. Any month. And even at any destination. Subject to availability of course. Remember, places are limited.
That means you’re not picking from a pre-selected range of package holidays chosen by Jet2, you can use the free child places deal with every single holiday they offer on their website.
It even includes getaways during the school holidays when prices are usually higher.
In other words, if Jet2 fly there, you can get at least one of your children there for free.
What About Single Parent Families?
Holidays are much harder for single parent families. No one would debate that. But sadly, the cost of a holiday is expensive and there is only so much help companies like Jet2 can give.
They can afford to give free child places to two full paying adults, but not to one. Of course, if you have two children then you can still claim the Free Child Place deal on one of those children, because you are paying full price for the other. So it depends on how many kids you have and how old they are.
However, this comes with a caveat, because while Jet2 have to draw the line at totally free child places for single parent families made up of one adult and one child, they do have a few other deals that could help.
First, infants go free with Jet2 on all package deals. That means if your child is under 2 years old, they will go free – even if you are claiming a Free Child Place deal for an older child. Not only that, but there are some additional benefits to the free infant deal which make the trip even easier:
- An extra 10kg of luggage for free.
- Two pieces of equipment like a car seat, travel cot, or pushchair, free.
- Creches and kids clubs at the hotel (where these are included).
This is in addition to flights, accommodation and transfers.
Now, I don’t know about you, but I think that’s pretty generous.
Plus, if you have an older child, they also offer a £60 discount for single parents. This isn’t going to suddenly make the unaffordable affordable, but it’s a gesture, and every little helps!