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2003, A long time
Analyst's have put figures around £1-1.5b for the whole airline operation. It is an ageing fleet however with over capacity and headwinds in Europe. On the plus side has great slots and is profitable.
Whatever, looking at your posts your motive is crystal clear. Bye
https://www.karismahotels.com/ Take a look. Tui operate their Sensimar and Sensatori brands through Karisma hotels. Very good appointment by TCG, here's a man with knowledge of mass middle market Tui practices and more recent on the ground hotel operations. What's not to like?
Karisma are a top hotel chain aimed at the middle market
Nice to see another short reducing, not all upward rising as the mail article led to believe
http://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/336275/lufthansa-deals-blow-to-thomas-cook-over-condor-acquisition
Trade write up of the latest negative comments for Luft last week. Little nugget was buried in the text.
TCG are considering 7 offers for the airline
Easyjet flight actually and completely out of TC hands. Could happen to any dynamic package agent. Easyjet at fault.
Interesting insight from ex Thomson (Tui) Sales and Marketing Manager http://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/336186/comment-thomas-cook-should-avoid-running-the-race-to-the-bottom
http://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/335923/thomas-cook-relaunches-airtours?fbclid=IwAR04glyUcWED054VLi8xPDLeHLgtwJauzlOfjxlrwEyMta7_7u_VokzPmME
'Thomas Cook relaunches Airtours brand to focus on dynamic packages'
They appear to be well on their way to asset light operations, dynamic packages are package holidays created on demand. For example any airline and any hotel from various suppliers pulled from live product feeds on availability and pricing.
JJ, only if the company is based in the UK. ATOL protection applies to UK based companies that sell a flight inclusive holiday or are a third party flight-reseller (as airlines cannot ATOL protect themselves). Look as far back as Low Cost Holidays, was UK registered and required ATOL, relocated to Balearics and dropped the ATOL in favour of the Spanish system which was woefully inadequate ( at something like €1.5m bond), lots of customers out of pocket and credit card companies picking up the bill.
Tui is German but they choose to funnel UK sales through a UK based company in the group, hence then having to have ATOL. You won't see a headline about the CAA/ ATOL near the talks as it's black and white, UK based must have it, non UK then not a CAA/ ATOL/ UK problem to solve.
It's nothing to do with ATOL, the insurers mentioned cover the non UK business. ATOL covers UK and is not part of this. If a sale to Fosun happens then TC will no longer be a UK registered business within the scope of UK and EU regulation and legal framework, it will most probably be a Hong Kong/ China based entity. All of their contracts will be written with the current legal framework behind them.
The article alludes to the insurers requesting a seat at the table with regard to the Fosun negotiations. There are no concerns about general going concern talks.
Insurers taking control? Just a tad bit misleading, make that Grand Canyon sized misleading.
Sky News seems to be the place for leaks. This is strong news that a sale of the Tour Op is building.
Topical comedy here as Lufthansa own Brussels Airlines, a nine hour flight to nowhere
https://onemileatatime.com/brussels-airlines-flight-to-nowhere/?fbclid=IwAR1Myo0CNci55poIqB--6kJRWWSgC6_qn_SrNibZv1TBLzrEgvXCc72qHiI
Sp has been down the last two business days and ended up a blue close
Further to this, a package holiday isn't just a flight/ hotel. It is two elements, can be hotel/ car hire, hotel/ tour excursion. Doesn't have to be overseas, can be London hotel/ theatre ticket. If the elements are sold together and at one price it's a package event and the PTR's 2018 section 20 demands bonding should be in place.
This update to the regs is still relativuly new, even though it's been on route from the EU for years so lot's of companies are falling foul of it presently but as that tightens up it's good news for the traditional package operators like TC, Tui, Jet2, Expedia etc...
JJ, welcome to travel and the myriad of confusion. Keeping it simple, there are two types of bonding in these conversations. The one you refer to is the agent themselves, not tour operator, (in this case a pyramid selling US outfit called Inteletravel) they are selling other peoples product i.e selling a Thomas Cook holiday and using the customers card to pay directly to Thomas Cook and avoiding the regs on bonding. To be compliant, and operate a decent business in my view, in the UK the agent should be bonded, this allows the customer to pay the agent who then passes on the money to the tour operator, in most cases through a client account model. The bonding covers against the risk of insolvency.
The second limb to bonding is tour operator bonding/ ATOL bonding, this allows an agent to be a tour operator (create and sell package holidays) and act as the principle for the holiday arrangements. This protects against insolvency and dictates what should occur in the event of a failure of the holiday or any critical components.
In short a holiday (2 or more linked travel arrangements in one transaction) cannot be sold by an unbonded business legally, the unbonded agents detailed above, whilst circumventing the regs are without doubt breaching GDPR and Data Protection rules.
No problem. Reasons for interest on packages and TC is due to the law change in July18. Prior to this date lots of online travel agents sold 'non packages' through a loop hole created by a legal case between Travel Republic and the government. That was closed in the new regs and bought most travel purchases under the new 'package regs'. This has bought considerably more costs into the model the online guys have that sell flight and hotel together and levels the playing field with traditional tour ops like TC, a definite boost to those that already compiled, like TC and this will start to filter through the figures this year and onwards.
oneandonly1, Yes anything that constitutes duel elements, i.e. flight/ hotel, hotel/transfer sold together is a package.
Airbnb currently sell packages with their new tour offers too, although they are currently breaching UK consumer law in doing so as they do not provide the relevant bonding to cover them. So expect more concern paid to these new operators by UK regulators over the coming months and years.