customers

The holiday park chain is one of the most popular in the UK, offering a vast array of activities and family fun, but there’s one common issue in reviews that has seen it criticised, especially by parents

One of the UK’s most popular holiday park chains has been hit by a low score in a national ranking, with visitors particularly irked about one thing in particular.

Center Parcs has six holiday villages across the UK, and in a recent Which? survey, it was the most-visited holiday park on the list, especially popular for short breaks in its car-free forest locations.

Which? said: “You like that you know what you’re getting, from the acres of forest trails to the swimming pool in a heated glass dome – a subtropical paradise even in the soggiest of British summers. It also earned praise for appealing to all ages, whether that’s with the treetop aerial adventure or the thermal spa (with a volcanic steam room and an igloo-inspired ice cave).”

Have a story you want to share? Email us at webtravel@reachplc.com

The parks were also praised for their accommodation, with higher grades including facilities such as hot tubs, saunas, and games rooms, making it a solid “family favourite” according to Which?. But customers were particularly unhappy with one thing.

“However, it’s extraordinarily expensive, at more than twice the price of budget rival Haven. Activities cost even more on top, and you need to secure your preferred slots weeks in advance. The two-star rating for value for money is the joint lowest in our survey. You could save a fortune by choosing a better-rated rival,” the Which? survey noted.

In most aspects, Center Parcs performed well. It was awarded four stars for activities, entertainment and facilities, as well as quality of accommodation and cleanliness. It achieved three stars for customer service and food and drink. But its place in the rankings, fifth from the bottom, came due to its value for money score at just two stars. It was the third most expensive of all the holiday parks surveyed.

It’s not the first time the chain has been criticised for its high prices. In a viral social media post, one fed-up mum showed the difference in prices between a school holiday and September dates at the parks, commenting: “If anyone’s unsure when their kids return to school after the holidays, Center Parcs have this handy tool.” A four-night break in August was priced at £1,049, while the same holiday a week later, post-school holidays, was £529.

Even positive reviews of the parks often mention the price. One recent review of Center Parcs Woburn Forest said: “Amazing place to holiday. Personally, I felt the prices of things on-site were a little high, and that was even going outside of term-time; however, you cannot fault the fun and wonder of being at these parks.”

Another was more blunt: “Badly overpriced, we only paid £799 for a family of 4 and it still felt like a rip off. You get a good room, yes, but it’s nothing you can’t get at a hotel in the countryside for half the price. Every single other activity charged extra (except swimming which is decent but you can get a similar quality just slightly more warm out at Butlin’s for 1/10th of the price).”

Center Parcs has been contacted for comment.

The UK’s best and worst holiday parks

(Name of resort, overall customer score)

1. Potters Resorts – 83%
2. Hoburne Holidays – 81%
3. Darwin Escapes – 80%
4. Landal Parks – 80%
5. Waterside Holiday Group – 80%
6. Shorefield Holidays – 76%
7. Away Resorts – 75%
8. Bluestone Wales – 75%
9. Park Leisure UK – 75%
10. Highland Holidays – 74%
11. Lyons Holiday Parks – 74%
12. Largo Leisure – 73%
13. Park Holidays UK – 73%
14. Warner Coastal Villages – 73%
15. Forest Holidays – 72%
16. John Fowler Holidays – 72%
17. Center Parcs – 69%
18. Haven Holidays – 68%
19. Parkdean Resorts – 68%
20. Butlin’s – 63%
21. Pontins – 61%

Based on a survey of 2,221 Which? Connect panel members and general public conducted in February and March 2026.

EXCLUSIVE: A female pilot has shared the way she’s experienced sexism in the workplace, saying it’s probably not in the way you think, and shared a common misconception about pilots

Raja Katz was around 12 or 13 years old when she realised being a pilot was the “only thing” she wanted to do as a career. But it wasn’t because she wanted to follow in any family members’ footsteps, as she “didn’t know any pilots, let alone a female one” – it was just a gut feeling she had.

To test out her theory, at 15 she “started flying gliders,” which is how she managed to “turn the fascination into something concrete”. She explained: “Looking back, not having a role model or mentor of my own is a big part of why I now spend so much time trying to help increase representation for female pilots.”

Now, speaking exclusively to the Mirror, Raja has lifted the lid on what life as a female airline pilot – and how passengers react when they realise there’s a woman in the cockpit.

How did Raja become a pilot?

Raja, who posts on social media as @raja_in_the_sky, explained: “Broadly, there are two ways in. You can go through an airline’s own cadet programme, where you’re selected and trained specifically for that airline, which is comparatively rare and highly competitive. Or you go through a private flight school that you fund yourself, which is the far more common route.

“Either way, you start with classroom training, the theoretical side covering things like air law, meteorology, navigation and aircraft systems, and you sit a set of legal exams for that, either alongside or before your practical flying. The practical side starts on small, single-engine aircraft and builds up from there.

“You then add a multi-engine rating, which qualifies you to fly aircraft with more than one engine, along with an instrument rating and multi-crew training. Once you’ve completed the required theory exams, you hold what’s called a “frozen” ATPL (Airline Transport Pilot License), which becomes a full license once you’ve built up enough flight hours.

“The final and most specific step is the type rating: the license for one particular aircraft type, an Airbus A320 or a Boeing 737, for example. This is most often provided or paid for by your employer once you’re hired.”

A typical day

Raja explained that there’s no such thing as a typical day at work as a pilot, and “every day is different”, but that’s what she loves about it. She explained: “Flying long-haul, you start your working day at your home base anywhere between early morning and late evening, depending on the flight.

“You report for duty and meet your fellow pilots, and depending on the flight time, there can be more than two of us on duty for a flight. Shortly after, you meet the cabin crew and go over the particulars for that flight: safety-relevant aspects and procedures, often for the first time, since it’s frequently the first time most of us have met at all.

“Then we take the crew bus out onto the apron (the area of the airport where planes are parked), boarding the aircraft, and once all checks are complete, the passengers board too. We finish our flight preparations: entering the route into the onboard computer, calculating our takeoff speeds, and thoroughly briefing the crew on that specific departure.

“Once loading is done and everyone’s on board, we get pushed back, taxi to the runway, run through our checklists, and we’re ready to take off. During cruise, we’re constantly monitoring weather, routing and terrain, and building contingency plans in case we ever need to land immediately.

“My long-haul sectors typically run between seven and 14 hours. As we get closer to our destination, we brief the entire approach and descent procedure in detail. After landing, we taxi to the gate, the passengers disembark, we hand the aircraft over to maintenance for its routine checks, and we head off to clear immigration and get to the hotel.”

Her experience with sexism

Raja has experienced sexism, but probably not “in the way people expect”. She explained: “The pilots and cabin crew I actually fly with have never questioned my competence, not once, and my colleagues take me seriously. Where I do notice it is with passengers, and it happened more often when I was flying short-haul.

“On those smaller aircraft, there’s barely any physical distance between where passengers board and the cockpit door, so people would see me walk in and react on the spot. Long-haul jets are bigger, and there’s simply much less contact between passengers and the flight crew, so I hardly ever get those moments now.

“Any form of discrimination is, of course, unacceptable. Sometimes, however, it’s more of a surprise on some faces when a woman is flying rather than rejection, and I understand that reaction, because it’s still rare”.

What Raja wishes people knew about pilots

Raja explained there’s “one thing” that she’d “love to clear up”. “It’s the difference between ‘pilot’ and ‘co-pilot’, because a lot of people assume the co-pilot is somehow the backup, someone who’s there just in case and doesn’t really fly the plane”, she said.

She continued: “That’s not how it works. Both the captain and the first officer, which is the correct term for what most people call the co-pilot, hold the same type rating for that aircraft and are both fully qualified to fly it.

“We take turns being ‘pilot flying’ and ‘pilot monitoring’ from one leg to the next, so on any given flight, it might be the first officer’s hands on the controls for takeoff and landing, not the captain’s. I’m a first officer myself, so I fly plenty of those sectors, take-offs and landings included, exactly like a captain would.

“The real difference between the two roles is seniority and responsibility. Captains have more experience and additional command training, and they carry the final legal authority and responsibility for the flight. But day to day, both of us are pilots in every sense of the word”.

For more information on learning to become a pilot, including the qualifications needed and the costs involved, visit the Civil Aviation Authority website.

The firm said it only became aware of the hack on Tuesday and quickly prevented the hackers gaining any more access, and notified affected customers.

“We immediately contained the risk and have been working with specialist advisors and taking appropriate steps to protect our customers and systems,” MAG said.

“We have informed and are working with the relevant authorities.”

The airport group said the e-mail addresses obtained by the hackers came from passengers signing up to the airports’ on-site wifi.

More detailed data, including vehicle registrations, came from people booking car-park spaces, arranging access to lounges, and booking fast-track.

Customers are urged to remain vigilant about suspicious emails, text messages or phone calls and avoid opening attachments from unknown contacts.

The identity of the hackers was known, MAG said, and the relevant authorities had been informed.

Thirteen years ago, on the final Sunday in September, Skip Schumaker struck out. It was the last out in the last game of the regular season.

For the Dodgers, no big deal: They had won the National League West, and the playoffs were four days away.

For Dodgers fans that subscribed to Cox Communications, it turned out to be the start of a bizarre and protracted blackout that cost viewers the final years of Vin Scully and the golden years of three World Series championships.

After 4,560 days, the blackout is over.

On Friday, for the first time in 13 years, Cox subscribers within the Dodgers’ broadcast territory will be able to watch the team on their local television home. Fans can find SportsNet LA on Channel 63 in Orange County, Channel 54 in Palos Verdes, Channel 36 in Santa Barbara and Channel 50 in Las Vegas.

How did this finally come to pass? Those channels no longer belong to Cox.

Charter Communications, the company responsible for getting SportsNet LA on as many cable, satellite and streaming options as possible, on Thursday closed its $34.5-billion purchase of Cox.

For Dodgers fans, the takeaway is this: It no longer matters that Cox did not want to pay Charter for the rights to air SportsNet LA. Charter made the 13 years of that moot by buying Cox.

Charter offers broadcast service under the Spectrum brand.

In 2013, with the team in the final year of its local television agreement with Fox Sports, the Dodgers announced it would launch a team-owned channel the following year.

In exchange for the rights to market and distribute that SportsNet LA channel, Time Warner Cable agreed to pay the Dodgers $8.35 billion over 25 years. It was the last great regional sports network deal, with traditional broadcast audiences about to fragment amid the rise of streaming and cord-cutting.

The guaranteed rights fees are as sure of a revenue stream as anything in baseball, and the Dodgers’ success amid all that cash is one of the triggers for major league owners in their push for a salary cap.

However, the great regional sports network deals relied on cable and satellite subscribers paying for every channel in a bundle, most of which viewers never watched.

With DirecTV leading the resistance, cable and satellite providers balked at signing up for SportsNet LA: a few dimes per month per subscriber for a news or entertainment channel was fine, but they drew the line at $5 per month subscriber for a baseball channel.

No major Los Angeles outlet besides Time Warner Cable carried SportsNet LA until 2016, and then only because Charter bought Time Warner Cable. Even then, less than half the households in the Los Angeles market could get SportsNet LA.

In 2020, DirecTV and AT&T struck a deal with Charter, not so much to liberate Dodgers fans as to help the parties maintain a shrinking base of subscribers amid a proliferation of video options.

“I think I can speak for a lot of people who will say this is, maybe, long overdue,” Dodgers star Justin Turner said then.

Six years later, as a longtime Cox subscriber excited to see SportsNet LA for the first time, your humble correspondent can say this: I think I can speak for a lot of people who will say this is definitely long overdue.

Budget airline easyJet cancelled around 100 flights out of France last weekend with the possibility of further disruption this summer due to industrial action

Thousands of UK passengers are being urged to check if they are eligible for compensation after strikes by easyJet’s French cabin crew.

The budget airline cancelled around 100 flights out of France last weekend with the possibility of further disruption this summer. easyJet passengers flying through Paris, Nice, Bordeaux and Lyon are among those that have faced cancellations and delays.

Under EU regulation 261/2004, passengers can claim compensation if their flight is cancelled in certain circumstances. This can range from €125 (£106) to €600 (£513) – and this is per person.

How much money you are due depends on the length of the flight, plus how much notice you were given for the cancellation and the time of your alternative flight.

For example, if your flight distance was less than 1,500km and it was cancelled less than seven days before you were due to depart, you would be due €125 compensation if your rescheduled flight takes off more than one hour before your original flight, and arrives less than two hours after it.

You can find a full breakdown of the payouts below. But it is important to note that the airline normally only has to pay if it was their fault your flight was cancelled. This can include strikes involving an airline’s staff, including cabin crew, as this is deemed the responsibility of the airline.

Strikes outside of an airline’s control – such as air traffic control, airport security or baggage handlers – are seen as extreme circumstances, and would therefore be unlikely to qualify for compensation.

Consumer rights expert Martyn James said: “The strike compensation rules can seem a little confusing, but the rule of thumb is: if the staff work directly for the airline (cabin crew, pilots) then you should get compensation for delayed or cancelled flights.

“If the staff work as ground crew or for the airport, they don’t directly work for the airline, so the business can’t be considered to have ‘anticipated’ the situation and prevented it.

“Needless to say airlines don’t like this reading of the law. And in fact it was only clarified after they were taken to court by a disgruntled passenger.

“So remember to push back if they refuse your claim – or if they try to blame something else, like the weather or ground crew. As for a written response to your claim, especially if they turn it down.”

The flight you were on must have departed from a UK airport on any airline, or arrived at an airport in the UK on an EU or UK airline, or arrived at an airport in the EU on a UK airline.

If you believe you are entitled to compensation for a cancelled flight, you can make a complaint directly to your airline.

If the airline refuses to pay out, your next step should be to contact the relevant alternative dispute resolution (ADR) scheme.

Flight was cancelled between 7 and 14 days before departure

• Distance; Less than 1,500km – Rescheduled flight takes off more than two hours before your original flight, and arrives less than two hours after it – €125 compensation
• Distance; Less than 1,500km – Rescheduled flight takes off more than two hours before your original flight, and arrives more than two hours after it – €250 compensation
• Distance; Less than 1,500km – Rescheduled flight arrives more than four hours after your original flight – €250 compensation
• Distance; Between 1,500km and 3,500km – Rescheduled flight takes off more than two hours before your original flight, and arrives less than three hours after it – €200 compensation
• Distance; Between 1,500km and 3,500km – Rescheduled flight takes off more than two hours before your original flight, and arrives three to four hours after it – €400 compensation
• Distance; Between 1,500km and 3,500km – Rescheduled flight arrives more than four hours after your original flight – €400 compensation
• Distance; More than 3,500km – Rescheduled flight departs more than two hours before your original flight, and arrives less than four hours after it – €300 compensation
• Distance; More than 3,500km – Rescheduled flight arrives more than four hours after your original flight – €600 compensation

Flight was cancelled less than 7 days before departure

• Distance; Less than 1,500km – Rescheduled flight takes off more than one hour before your original flight, and arrives less than two hours after it – €125 compensation
• Distance; Less than 1,500km – Rescheduled flight arrives more than two hours after your original flight – €250 compensation
• Distance; Between 1,500km and 3,500km – Rescheduled flight departs more than one hour before your original flight, and arrives less than three hours after it – €200 compensation
• Distance; Between 1,500km and 3,500km – Rescheduled flight arrives more than three hours after your original flight – €400 compensation
• Distance; More than 3,500km – Rescheduled flight departs more than one hour before your original flight, and arrives less than four hours after it – €300 compensation
• Distance; More than 3,500km – Rescheduled flight arrives more than four hours after your original flight – €600 compensation