Safety Tips
Travel Safety Rules
FOR PARENTS AND CARE PROVIDERS
- Make sure family or friends at home know your itinerary and inform them of any changes.
- Review personal safety rules with your children before leaving home.
- Avoid night driving. If you must, keep all doors locked and do not roll down your windows allowing someone to reach in the vehicle.
- Keep a list of phone numbers you might need handy in order to reach the police, fire department, hotel, embassy or consulate. (Give a copy of this list to each person travelling with you.)
- Make sure your children know the name and location of the hotel you are staying in. Give them the hotel business card to guarantee they have access to this information.
- Do not let your children use hotel facilities unsupervised. Look for hotels with supervised play centres.
- Stay in larger hotels with better security.
- Reserve rooms between the second and the seventh floor above ground level to deter easy entrance from outside, but low enough for fire equipment to reach.
- Identify visitors before opening the door of your hotel room.
- Make sure your children know not to accept rides or favours from strangers.
- Never leave your child unattended.
- Learn a few words of the local language in case you need to ask for help or communicate that you are in danger. i.e. need doctor, police, fire; just enough to get the point across; it may only be one word: STRANGER.
FOR CHILDREN
- Do not tell anyone your hotel room number or discuss travel plans` with strangers.
- If someone knocks on the hotel room door (even if you think it is room service), do not answer it. Get an adult to let them in.
- Do not enter elevators alone if there is another person inside. Wait for the next car.
- Always bring someone along with you when using hotel facilities like swimming pools or arcades. Take a friend - it's safer and much more fun. Always tell an adult where you're going.
- Try to have everyone "fit in" in terms of clothing and appearance. Flashy clothing pinpoints you as tourists and potential victims to abductors.
