TOUR OPERATORS


Guy Novik


Travel Weekly webcasts: Price hikes, Refund Credit Notes and consumer prote ABTA’S MARK TANZER


Travel Weekly’s Lucy Huxley


Debbie Goffin


Paul Cleary


Travel Mark Tanzer


Operators say 2021 price hikes risk cancellations


T


our operators have accused airlines and hoteliers of hiking prices for 2021 to a level that


is more likely to make customers cancel rather than rebook. Premier Holidays said airfares for


next year were in many cases higher than customers had paid this year, while Caribtours said hoteliers’ prices were unrealistic and not based on forward booking predictions for the post-pandemic market. Caribtours is contacting hotel


partners to urge them to reduce prices. If they don’t, chief executive Paul Cleary fears clients will cancel. “Hotels are still working on 2021


rates which were set three months ago,” he said. “We are going to every single


hotel with every booking that’s on a credit note to say, ‘you need to do the right thing’. Agents will not swallow [higher prices]; their bookings will turn into refunds very quickly.” The hotel cost accounts for about 60% of the price of a Caribtours booking, which average £10,500. Cleary felt confident hoteliers


10 14 MAY 2020


would respond, but added: “It’s a very difficult message to say to someone ‘your holiday that was £10,000 last month is now £12,000’.” Premier Holidays sales and


marketing director Debbie Goffin said airfares were proving the challenging part of rebooking tailor- made holidays. “We’re getting some amazing


deals on the ground, especially in the Channel Islands and the Far East, which will help rebookings,” she said. “[But] in many cases, the airline


prices are more than this year. In time that might even out but at the moment, we can only go with the prices in the system.” By contrast, USAirtours said it


had not seen price hikes in its core US destinations. Chief executive Guy Novik said he was confident UK visitors would be welcomed back in the US. He said: “In the past when there have been big challenges, like 9/11, the US domestic market tended to stay at home.” Novik said that made ground suppliers “even more dependent on international business”, adding: “I don’t see that changing.”


Weekly’s Ian Taylor


Tanzer urges agents to ’build confidence in RCNs’


A


bta chief executive Mark Tanzer cautioned agency members against paying customers cash


refunds for cancelled holidays out of government loans. He insisted the best solution is


“to build confidence in refund credit notes”. Tanzer said: “Agents are in a


very difficult position. They want to preserve the customer relationship, and the customer is knocking on the door wanting a refund from the operator. “I feel for them being caught in


the middle and feeling, ‘Do I keep the customer or take the risk that I may not get the refund from the tour operator or may not get it soon?’” But he said: “The best way to


resolve this is to build confidence in the Refund Credit Note system. “The customer can have a credit


note for a future booking and a cash- refund guarantee, rather than being scared that if they don’t get the cash now they will lose out. “Getting people to understand refund credits, getting confidence


Getting people to


understand Refund Credit Notes is the best solution


in them, knowing that the CAA and Abta stand behind them, is the best solution rather than taking out emergency loans to pay refunds.” But the Abta chief rejected the


suggestion that a Refund Credit Note could replace a refund if a customer insisted on a cash repayment. He said: “From the start of this


crisis, we have been very clear that customers are entitled to a refund if their package holiday is cancelled. We said we will make our members engage with customers and recognise there is an obligation to a refund. What we can’t do is make them pay in 14 days if they haven’t got the cash. “If clients have pressing needs, they should tell the travel company ‘I want my refund now; I don’t want a refund credit note’ and agree the timeframe for that refund to be paid.”


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