Speaking during a UKinbound webinar on Tuesday (28 April), Nigel Huddleston said he recognised refunds were a "hot topic" right now, with MPs "inundated" with correspondence from both sides of the debate.

Under the Package Travel Regulations (PTRs), consumers have a right to a full refund within 14 days for package travel bookings affected by the coronavirus crisis.

However, Abta has argued the regulations aren’t designed to cope with a complete cessation of travel that has left many businesses unable to pay refunds with money owed from airlines and suppliers still in the pipeline.

Abta is advising businesses to offer refund credit notes in lieu of an immediate refund, which can be cashed at a later date, to ensure otherwise good travel companies do not go to the wall.

This, though, has angered consumers, many of whom now face the prospect of waiting several months – if not longer – to get their money back, while their plight championed in the national press by consumer champions such as Which?.

"This is absolutely a hot topic at the moment," said Huddleston. "We’re [MPs] getting inundated on both sides of this issue in terms of businesses writing to us saying they’re struggling, and consumers saying they want their money back straight away.

"What we need to do is find a way [to ensure] this issue is not seen as consumers on the one hand and businesses on the other at loggerheads, and to integrate those interests. Of course, what we don’t want to see is consumers unintentionally demanding money back and then undermining the viability of that business.

"The reality at the moment is there is a legislative framework, the legal protocols are quite clear, whether that’s refunds, credit or more broadly [under] the Package Travel Directive. The law is very clearly what it is."

Abta has previously warned consumers would likely face a longer wait to get their cash back if firms pay out now and subsequently go out of business owing to the pressure this would place on the Atol scheme, which is still paying out claims following the failure of Thomas Cook last September.

Huddleston, who previously worked at Deloitte across the firm’s travel, hospitality and leisure divisions and at Google as the search giant’s industry head of travel, acknowledged businesses were struggling to process refunds – even where they are in a position to pay them – "because they don’t have the people on the ground to do them".

His comments came just hours after Advantage Travel Partnership chief executive Julia Lo Bue-Said’s warned the extent to which the travel sector has lent on the government’s job retention – or furlough – scheme had left many businesses unable to process rebooking and/or refund enquiries, both from agents and consumers, in a timely fashion.

Huddleston, who was, appointed in February, continued: "What I can say is we are having conversations, in particular between Beis [the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy] which is responsible for consumer affairs legislation and also the Department for Transport because this is a major issue I know with airlines, while a lot of tour operator responsibilities and stakeholder management sits with Beis.

"Rather than looking at that as a confusion or a problem, what I can tell you is we are working together to try to come up with a solution. It needs to be reasonable and sensible because there is this consumer and business dichotomy. But we’re taking the issue very seriously, we’re looking at what other countries have done, and we’re taking advice from the industry sectors as well.

"And again, there is real time sensitivity to this with the peak summer period and we’re aware of that. We all know it’s an urgent issue and we’re looking at it very seriously."

’Grey areas’

Elsewhere, Huddleston said he had discussed the issue of insurers failing to pay out on legitimate coronavirus claims from the travel and tourism sector with economic secretary to the Treasury, John Glen.

Huddleston said while there was "genuine confusion and reason for debate", there was no doubt that where a policy does – and should – cover Covid-19, the expectation should be the insurance industry pays out.

He added proper insurance payouts would ease the burden on government and free up state cash to assist other areas of the travel and tourism sector.

On business rates relief, Huddleston said he recognised some B2B businesses, as well as tour operators and coach operators, had fallen between the cracks in the government’s scheme, and confirmed he had raised the matter with the Treasury.

The minister also stressed that such was the immediate need for relief, the hospitality and leisure sector was tacked onto the government’s retail programme "to get money out the door quickly".

He did, however, reiterate that while there were a number of "explicit" inclusions, the guidance on the scheme was, in some business categories, open to interpretation at local government level, and urged businesses to discuss the matter with their local authority or the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. "There are genuinely some grey areas," he said.

Earlier this month, the Local Government Association updated its guidance on rates relief to advice councils to consider a broader range of premises following an intervention by the Tourism Alliance, which was in turn supported by UKinbound.

’Transition period’

In response to a question on furloughed workers, Huddleston said he couldn’t comment on any further extension to government’s job retention scheme, but revealed there would like be a "transition period" taking into account the speed with which some sectors will be able to resume operations.

He said a timeline would be "pivotal" for the tourism, hospitality and leisure sectors, particularly with respect to whether any domestic attractions could yet operate this summer, and advised firms to "expect clarification" on the future of the scheme "in a number of weeks".

However, Huddleston also reiterated any decision on lifting social distancing measures and resuming tourism, hospitality and leisure functions would be guided by government medical advice, although he did note some sub-sectors would likely be able to meet social distancing requirements with greater ease than others.

Huddleston added he would make strong representations on behalf of tourism, hospitality and leisure in the Treasury’s upcoming spending review, and said there was a "fair degree" of appetite and support within government to get the UK’s tourism sector moving again given its importance to so many constituencies.