EasyJet Holidays has launched a “deposit return” scheme allowing customers who are unable to travel this summer to put their money towards a future trip.
The operator said the system would offer “even greater flexibility” to anyone due to travel in June, July and August.
Under the scheme, any customers with existing bookings for holidays this summer will retain their deposits as a credit towards a new booking to be made within the next year.
Customers can change their existing bookings online to another holiday currently on sale and due to depart up to October 2021.
For a limited time, customers choosing this option will also be offered a discount off their new holiday as a thank you.
“Any customers still wanting to travel this summer should make any outstanding balance payments towards their holiday as normal. Customers with fully paid holidays in this scenario do not need to do anything currently,” the operator said.
EasyJet Holidays said it was cancelling bookings “in strict departure date order” with impacted customers offered full refunds back to their original payment method.
The operator “reiterated its commitment” to processing full refunds “as quickly as possible” – claiming an average 13.4-day window to reimburse customers.
Matt Callaghan, customer director, said: “We can’t wait to take people on holiday again, but we know that right now there’s a great deal of uncertainty about when that might happen.
“While we remain optimistic about when we can all go on holiday again we know that there’s a range of different views customers have about their upcoming travel plans.
“We just want to be able to give people as much choice as possible, so they can make the decision that’s right for them. And we believe our new deposit return solution takes this one step further as we go above and beyond our standard terms in these exceptional times.
“We hope the options we’re providing go some way to giving people more of a chance to book something to look forward to. At the same time, we’re working hard to process refunds for holidays we’ve had to cancel, and so far on average, we’ve been able to do this within 14 days.”