BUSINESS NEWS


Only 15 passengers required repatriation by the Atol scheme in the 12 months to March 2023


ATT fund swells to £169m on back of travel recovery


Fund back in health but Atol holder cashflows remain ‘stretched’. Ian Taylor reports


The recovery in the Air Travel Trust fund which backs up the Atol scheme marks a remarkable turnaround for outbound travel which has gone from the gravest crisis in its history early in the pandemic to new peaks in demand in the past year. The Air Travel Trust (ATT)


accounts and report for the 12 months to March 2023, published last week, reveal the fund held £169 million at the end of January. It had sunk to £20 million after the failure of Thomas Cook in 2019 wiped out a


48 8 FEBRUARY 2024


£260 million surplus and back-up insurance of £192 million. That surplus had been built


only since 2013, with the ATT in deficit from 1996 to 2012 despite introduction of the Atol Protection Contribution (APC) on Atol bookings from 2008. The fund took time to build owing


to the failures of XL Leisure Group in 2008 and Goldtrail Travel in 2010 and the APC, initially set at £1 per person per booking, was raised to £2.50 following the XL Leisure collapse. The record Atol bookings from


2022, combined with a historically low rate of failures – there were just eight in the 12 months to last March and five since – restored the fund to health. Only 15 passengers required repatriation and 17,000 refunds paid in the reporting period. Given this robust health, industry


figures could be forgiven for questioning the need for Atol reform and the CAA focus on segregation of customer money.


Continued on page 46 travelweekly.co.uk


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