Speaking yesterday (5 January) on the afternoon of the government’s announcement, Kelly Cookes, leisure director at the Advantage Travel Partnership said members had already seen a noticeable rise in bookings and enquiries following Christmas.
“We saw a big increase in enquiries and bookings last week versus Christmas week. And we were trading probably about 50% of 2019 levels last week. But interestingly, yesterday that jumped again, probably in anticipation of the [PCR testing] news and we’re more like 70 - 80% of 2019 levels.”
Cookes added that “across the board, we’ve currently got more bookings on the books to depart in 2022, than we had actually depart for the whole of 2021”.
“Things are looking good. It’s definitely slower than we would like to see it at this time of the year. But, we’re in a vastly different place from where we were at this point last year, which I think we’ve got to take as a positive.”
TTG+ members can watch the panel discussion in full here
Gemma Antrobus, owner of Haslemere Travel agreed and said “since coming back into the office since the turn of the year, it’s been really busy”.
She added that she expected the decision to scrap pre-departure testing to have a significant impact on business.
“I would like to think that as we had before when this [PCR testing] element was scrapped, from tomorrow onwards we will see a huge increase in bookings and inquiries and also confidence.”
Despite a strong few months prior to Christmas, Cookes noted that members were anxious for a good peaks, adding they “desperately want and need peaks to be if not as big as it was previously, at least bigger than the previous few months have been”.
“We’ve had almost 20 months now where most members would report anything from 75% to 90%, down on their general trading,” she said. “So while we’re seeing more positive pictures, that doesn’t make up for those 20 months of minimal trade. We absolutely need a bumper peaks for them to be able to get themselves back into a positive position.”
Elsewhere the panel voiced continued frustration with the different approach taken by European governments with regards to supporting their travel and tourism industries, with Diane Palumbo, sales and marketing director of Skiworld noting the contrast with the UK government’s approach.
“What we’ve noticed is European governments are not burdening their travel companies with loans, they are giving grants. Because if as a travel company, you’ve run down your reserves repatriating people post march 2020, refunding your customers in cash when your suppliers are either not refunding you, or giving you credit at best, there are a lot that are running really close to the wire. And yet our European competitors are receiving grants.”
Palumbo, who is also spokesperson for Seasonal Business in Travel added: “We will come out as an industry with levels of debt… and when you’re burdened with debt, do you invest in your infrastructure in the future?
“If the UK government lets travel agents and tour operators go without any financial support, what we’re going to have is yet another inflationary pressure in the economy, because we’re going to have an enormous demand and not a huge amount of supply.”
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