search.noResults

search.searching

dataCollection.invalidEmail
note.createNoteMessage

search.noResults

search.searching

orderForm.title

orderForm.productCode
orderForm.description
orderForm.quantity
orderForm.itemPrice
orderForm.price
orderForm.totalPrice
orderForm.deliveryDetails.billingAddress
orderForm.deliveryDetails.deliveryAddress
orderForm.noItems
NEWS


Those of us who have been around for a while remember the collapse of Clarksons in 1974.


That led to the Atol system of consumer


protection. It also led to the formation of Aito in 1976 – a group of small operators seeking a way to put bonding in place to comply with the Atol rules. Regulations have always been adjusted to


Noel Josephides DIRECTOR OF INDUSTRY ISSUES, AITO


Regulations have been adjusted before and can be so again


meet the requirements of a changing market. In 1992 came the first Package Travel Directive from Brussels, further strengthening consumer protection both for licensable and non-licensable packages. I remember several visits to Brussels with


Kevin Davies of the then-named Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). He was a real expert in anything to do with the regulations. I wish we still had him at what is now called the Department for Business (BEIS), which seems to lack the business experience to deal with the predicament we face. As time went on, both the Package Travel


Regulations and the Atol regulations have been tweaked from time to time to meet the requirements of the market, which continues to evolve.


Industry changes The biggest change followed the deregulation of EU air space and the coming of age of the internet. This signalled the rise of the OTAs. They


insisted they were merely agents for the service providers and therefore did not need an Atol as they were not creating packages. This growing trend alarmed the Atol regulator,


the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). So in 2012, it introduced Flight-Plus to legalise the OTAs’ way of working. Since then, further adjustments to the legislation have been made, culminating in the 2018


Package Travel Regulations designed to fit the then trading environment.


Unforeseeable crisis These regulations did not foresee and were never intended to cope with the arrival of Covid-19. The repercussions are neither the fault of the


tour operator nor the client. However, the 2018 PTR remedy is only in favour of the client – that is, a cash refund within 14 days – leaving the industry in a veritable mess in the current crisis. We know that Abta, the CAA and the


Department for Transport are pragmatic, with many years’ experience in dealing with industry collapses. They want to offer a breathing space to the industry by temporarily adjusting the regulations to enable cash to flow and travel firms to survive this blip. Consumers will not lose their money. They


would simply be asked to wait a while, thus sharing a little of the pain. The regulations have been adjusted before, and can be adjusted again, both to suit the client and the industry as a whole. Anyone in the industry who does not grasp


this undoubtedly has a different agenda – perhaps one that is self-serving, rather than thinking of the greater good of consumers and industry alike. Consumers, after all, would be far poorer should


the majority of the travel industry be forced into liquidation for no good reason other than cashflow being temporarily stymied by the current set of PTRs, in circumstances that no one could have foreseen a matter of months ago.


Read more columns by Noel Josephides: go.travelweekly.co.uk/comment


14


23 APRIL 2020


travelweekly.co.uk


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36