The French capital is the most popular overseas city break for UK holidaymakers, according to Abta and consistently tops the list of most popular destinations on global travellers’ bucketlists.
There were large numbers of British tourists present in Paris at the time of last Friday’s massacre, however UK operators and agents told TTG that most had chosen to remain in the city, with only a handful of clients returning home or cancelling upcoming breaks in the capital.
Superbreak said it had 150 customers in Paris at the time of the attacks, with “many more due to travel over the weekend”.
“We expected a very busy day [on Saturday],” said Jane Atkins, sales and product director at SuperBreak. “But the British traveller is resilient, and we experienced far fewer cancellations than expected - despite allowing free cancellations - and no one wished to curtail their travel arrangements.”
Ted Wake, joint managing director of city break specialist Kirker Holidays insisted that most clients’ attitudes remained “very positive”.
“The discerning traveller is pragmatic,” he said. “We’re all aware that there’s a security issue… but if you go to Paris now, there is no question that it’s a safer place than last week.”
Wake admitted some clients due to travel to the French capital had contacted the operator to discuss the situation, but that they would still be going ahead with their trip.
He added that he had even taken a Paris booking on Saturday for four people in January. “The client said he couldn’t wait to get to Paris and speak to the locals and show them solidarity,” Wake added.
Victoria Lavender, marketing manager at Osprey Holidays said one customer had cancelled, but that while the company was “sensitive to the situation and is monitoring things”, it was largely “business as usual”.
Abta also suggested that it did not expect Paris to see too much of a slump in visitor numbers. “It is too early to say whether these attacks will impact on visitor numbers from the UK, however previous terrorist incidents such as the 2005 bombings in London did not have a significant impact on visitor numbers to the capital,” a spokesperson said.
Despite this, there were fears however that the weekend’s tragedy could affect tourism more generally.
Sue Reid, deputy group general manager at Midcounties Co-operative Travel said the agency had 18 customers in Paris at the time of the attack, with a further 70 scheduled to travel to the city between now and November 30.
She admitted that some had chosen to cancel, and that the agency had subsequently offered full refunds to several clients out of its own pocket. “We wanted to be supportive to our customers,” she said.
Reid added that coming so soon after the suspected bomb attack on the Russian passenger jet earlier this month, the Paris tragedy would likely lead to a general “nervousness” about travelling.
“On the Saturday [after the Paris attack] our sales really flopped. We were down 50% compared with previous weeks when we had been seeing quite strong sales – there was a kneejerk reaction,” she said, but added: “We’re going into a quieter period anyway. I think they [sales] will come back.”
