A bomb cyclone, Artic air, and lots of snow are all set to hit the U.S. on one of the busiest travel weeks of the year. Travel industry expert Sandra McLemore explains why driving might not be the best option, what circumstances entitle passengers to a refund, and how to avoid letting the weather ice out your holiday plans.

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U.S. Winter Storm to Cause Major Delays: Expert Holiday Travel Hacks

millions of americans, including myself, all gonna be hitting the road and heading home for the holidays. So joining us live off a cruise ship off the coast of Mexico Sounds very nice. Is travel expert Sandra McLemore? Sandra. Good morning. Of course we'd all rather be where you're at right now. But there's a major yes, there's a yes, go ahead and start doing the dance Sandra. So Sandra, there's a major storm coming. Should travelers expect maybe a travel apocalypse here in lots of delays? Yeah, it's not gonna be good and it's not gonna be good just for this week or just for the storms part here. It's going to be bad for a couple of days after that. It could take two or three weeks actually to recover from the flight delays and flight cancelations. So this is a really big one. Okay, so since there's going to be so much trouble in skies, gas prices are at the lowest. They've been in almost a year and a half. So if they can, would you recommend people switch from flying to driving instead? Look if you're in the area of the storm, I absolutely don't recommend switching from flying to driving because here's what people are failing to do when they're driving, they're failing to check the weather in their current location destination and all the way along the route guides, you wanna make sure that you're safe all the way along. So if you're anywhere that's affected by the storm. The roads personally I think are not the best place to be. Sandra. Is there a particular route you think is the highest risk of seeing cancelations, we know a lot of people connect through places like Chicago O'hare in particular. Yeah, the bad news is no everywhere is going to be affected even out here on the west coast because here's the thing the flights come from everywhere. So your aircraft, you might be flying from Los Angeles to maybe san Francisco, you don't know where your aircraft from. It could be an aircraft that's coming in from Detroit or from Chicago or from new york. So delays are going to be widely spread. They try to keep the aircraft on the same side of the country and less impacted when possible. But that's not usually the case. Okay so we just showed a map of some of those hubs that may be infected. Would you suggest that people switch their flight to a different location? To try to avoid like a layover here, go to Mexico and then to your destination. Yeah come to Mexico and jump on a crazy good. Listen, what I would recommend if you can be flexible with your travel date is to switch up your travel. So the airlines are offering the opportunity right now to switch your flight dates and they're not charging anything at all. They actually want you to change if you can. So if it means flying into a different airport if it means delay in your travel. If it means leaving earlier at this stage, the storm was kind of already started. But yes if you can change your travel if you're flexible if your remote worker go ahead and do that, the airlines are letting you do that and they're hoping that you do that. Okay so Sandra, if your flight let's just say winds up being canceled or seriously delayed in what cases are you entitled to a refund here from the airlines? Yeah. So I want everybody to know their rights. You need to go to the Department of Transportation website where they have everything written out but I can explain it to you real quick. You are entitled to a 100% full refund. Not a credit note, not a voucher, not a gift card but a full refund cash for cash. Right? If your flight is can't so if the airline cancels your flight for whatever reason they've got to give your money back. Now here's the catch though. If they change your flight not cancel it. So maybe they change it for a couple of hours, maybe they change it same flight number later in the day or even the next morning. It's not really clear. The Department of Transport says on what is a cancelation is a change. Significant change changes should be a refund as well. But you can always push back if the airlines are going to work with you, you can always push back and file a formal complaint with the Department of Transport. For the most part guys the airlines are pretty cool with this at this time of year they don't want the long lines, they want all the complaints so you're entitled to a full refund. If they cancel your flight you just may have to be on hold for two hours until you get through to someone. Alright so whether we're driving or flying, what are some of your top tips that you can get for travelers this time of the year? Especially because it's so okay. Yeah so the flight tips are the most important the flight tips I would say check in online when it comes to seating, nobody is sharing their seats with you, nobody is changing seats with you at the airport or on board. So jump online, make sure that you can change early online, make sure that you've got all your seats together. If your airport offers curbside check in, you want to do that and you'll know that because the airlines will be right out on the curb, give them your baggage, tip them and go straight through the airport without it arrive early as well. Well, reserve your parking at the airport parking at the airport is the most stressful thing, especially when you're running late for drivers. You want to make sure that you map out your route like I said before, check the weather where you are where you're going to everywhere in between sure that you plotted out even your gas fill ups as well so that you don't have that panicked feeling on the freeway where you've got to fill up, make sure if you're going to drive over tonight that you've got a full day of rest. I don't know how many people think they can just now for an hour or two and then on the road. So rested driver is always a much safer driver. And even if you can share the driving as well and check that you've got adequate safety on in your car as well, if you need change for snow, windscreen clearance, all that kind of stuff. All right, well, all great advice and hopefully everybody has an amazing holiday because of this travel expert, Sandra McLemore, thank you so much for all those tips from a cruise ship in Mexico. So jealous.