HOW TO AVOID HICCUPS

Buy travel insurance: An annual multi-trip insurance policy can cost less than €50 for holders of private health insurance, and the cover could prove essential in the event of holiday disasters like stolen handbags, lost luggage or serious illnesses. Health insurance will only cover medical expenses up to around €65,000, which won't be enough if you ski off the side of a mountain and need to be airlifted home.

Buy it as soon as you book rather than at the last minute, so if you need to cancel for a valid and unforeseen reason, you can claim compensation under the policy.

Remember to check the terms of the policy for the list of exclusions.

Insurers won't pay out for everything, and under some policies even apparently innocuous activities like playing football can be classified as an extreme sport.

Shop with care

The converse of our fervent belief in "rip-off Ireland" is that everything we can get our hands on overseas is going to be so much better value.

But the European Consumer Centre (ECC) in Dublin advises consumers to buy only from recognised retailers and not get carried away with thoughts of a bargain. Where clothing, accessories and jewellery is concerned, "cheap" often means "fake". Very low price tags on electronic items should alert consumers to the possibility that the goods are faulty.However, all EU member states have implemented a directive on the sale of consumer goods, which gives consumers the right to a minimum guarantee on products of up to two years.

Shopping guides for all 25 EU member states are available from www.eccdublin.ie

Check mobile roaming rates

Holidaymakers often come home to a mobile phone bill that is twice or three times the amount they normally talk themselves into. This is because roaming rates - the charges mobile firms levy on customers when they make or receive calls abroad - aren't exactly cheap.

But each operator will have one set of roaming rates for their local or partner network and another, steeper set of rates for roaming on rival networks. This means customers can keep costs to a minimum by manually selecting the preferred network using the network selection function on their phones.

For example, a bill-paying Vodafone customer on holiday in Spain will be better off roaming on the local Vodafone network (Airtel). But O2 customers should manually select Telefonica (Mstar) to get the best rates.