Speaking after Thomas Cook released its full-year financial results to September 30, Peter Fankhauser, chief executive, said following the Brexit vote, he wanted the government to take actions which “make it easy for our customers in the UK to get to their holiday destination”.
The operator’s profit after tax was down from £19 million to £9 million.
However the UK business “continued to strengthen”, achieving a record underlying Ebit (earnings before interest and taxes) margin of 6.4%, growing by £33 million to £152 million.
Fankhauser continued: “There is something the government could do, today.
“UK APD is by far the highest in Europe and if the government wants to help families then I think it should cut APD to make it cheaper for them to enjoy a hard-earned holiday.”
Fankhauser insisted Cook was still “yet to see any noticeable impact from the Brexit vote”.
“We hedged our currency through to next year so it is hard to see any impact of the fall in sterling.”
Asked whether Cook had seen any impact on bookings to the US following the election outcome there, Fankhauser said: “No. Our customers are not visiting politicians, they are visiting destinations.
“We are actually seeing strong growth to the US.”
Cook’s bookings to US for the year to end of September were up 42% and the firm has taken “proactive steps” to switch capacity commitments from the eastern Mediterranean to other markets, which resulted in growth in holidays to Spain and the further expansion of its long-haul programme to destinations such as the US and Cuba.
Cook’s gross margin increased by 80 basis points to 23.4%, which the firm said reflected its effective capacity management and improved customer offering, which offset significant yield pressures in Condor its German airline.
Condor’s performance was attributed to weak demand for Turkey and “continuing overcapacity in the short and medium-haul sector”.
Fankhauser also said Thomas Cook UK web share was up 3 percentage points to 43% and is expected to rise further as people move online.
