INSIDE THIS
WEEK Contents
NEWS Hot Stories
Lowcost lost customers by axing Atol; supplier failure insurance could expose agencies; Lowcost failure ‘may damage whole industry’; UK will implement PTD; insurers warn tweets could void cover
Face to Face WIN!
Lowcost boss Paul Evans ‘devastated for customers, agents, staff and families’
A Thomson ‘boyfriend shirt’ designed by Helena Christensen page 44
Round-up
Hays Travel franchisee; Barrhead Travel Agent Achievement Awards 2016
The winners, the photos, the glamour Talk Back
Lowcost, Agent Achievement Awards
NEWS YOU CAN USE Product Hard Rock, Singapore Airlines
10 12 29 08 04 31
Operator Club Med, SuperBreak, Crystal 32 Ski; plus, firms vow ‘no Brexit surcharge’
Cruise Fathom, Celebrity, Clia awards 34
FRONTLINE Comment Noel Josephides on Lowcost 36
Readers’ Lives Fiona Jeffery, Hays Travel 38 Mystery Shopper Nottingham to Sicily 46
DESTINATIONS
Canada Wilderness: A back-to-nature break 48 Hours: St John’s food and wildlife
AGENT ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS 2016 16-page picture special of the industry’s best agent awards pages 12-27
North Africa Nile cruise: Visit the Valley of Kings
BUSINESS NEWS
Round-up Google, First Choice, Ryanair 70 Back page Refunds for Lowcost in doubt 72
48 54
60 WHAT
LUCY DID THISWEEK
28 JUL 1
2 3
Lucy Huxley Editor-in-chief @Lucy_Huxley
Had a great meeting with Hard Rock Hotels ahead of the opening of its exciting new property in Tenerife.
Trialled Cunard’s Google Cardboard virtual reality tour of the remastered QM2 with boss Simon Palethorpe and PR head Rachel Lloyd.
Had a brilliant day zipping around Carden Park in my very own personalised buggy at the Travel 2/Gold Medal & Travel Weekly golf day.
28 July 2016
travelweekly.co.uk 3 A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR
iven everything the industry has had to deal with of late, how galling to see the first weekend of peak summer bring 15-hour delays at the port of Dover with 12-mile tailbacks for families heading to France by ferry. Small wonder P&O Ferries chief executive Helen Deeble hit out at the failure to increase security staff numbers at the French border as “completely unacceptable”, insisting this “must never be allowed to happen again”. No one would want inadequate security, especially in the
current climate. But did the mass departures on the first weekend of school holidays in England and Wales really take anyone by surprise? Abta helpfully publicised the fact last Friday, estimating 2.3 million would be heading abroad over the weekend. Perhaps the association should add the French authorities to its contacts list. There were also delays in excess of three hours at
Heathrow immigration, with reports that extra Border Force staff had been redeployed from Channel ports to airports to help out. The port of Dover must have been pleased by that. Interestingly, Abta’s estimate of 2.3 million departures
was up on the 2.1 million the association forecast for the comparable weekend last year. It was also in line with almost every market indicator, suggesting holiday demand has not suffered despite the spate of terror attacks, the exchange rate of sterling, the post-EU referendum uncertainty or the collapse of Lowcost Travel Group. We have all the latest on that failure on the
following pages – including the only interview with the Lowcost boss himself (page 8). Let’s hope fears it could have a knock-on effect on other businesses prove unfounded.
Delays mar summer getaway G
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