[Poshgirl58]

My sympathy is with the employees too. They’ve suffered from years of bad management since the last rescue in 2012/14.

Apart from those who booked flight only and possibly staying in private villas/apartments, the repatriation will take place over the next two weeks. There may be some delays today/tomorrow for flights home. A Malaysian A380 arrived in MAN overnight, to start these flights, though can’t see how airports like Kos and Santorini will handle it!

The media love a sensationalist headline. Sky News earlier was doing its best to create panic. Listen to what the person you’re interviewing is saying, especially if they’re from CAA, ABTA or good old Simon Calder. One thing I learned was the hotels cannot demand payment from guests, as they will receive the money from the administrators. ABTA rep was adamant this should not be happening.

From experience, resolving a claim can take ages. I waited five months after the collapse of XL UK for the CAA to refund the cost of one-way flights PFO-BHX. Only found out about the repatriation flight when queuing at the check-in desk. To this day, still don’t know how the hotel knew we’d flown with XL (subcontract to Air Malta), as we’d booked flight and hotel separately. Got home within one hour of original scheduled time. Oh, nearly forgot, talking to TC rep in hotel about the situation, her words were “you’ll be alright, Air Malta will still fly”. How wrong she was….

[mkcol74]

The last Thomas Cook Airlines flight to land in the UK, inbound from MCO.
That would have been quite surreal as the operating crew.

[Poshgirl58]

German Government has provided a bridging loan to Condor (TC Germany) to cover “any liquidity issues”. Flights currently operating.

[Johnnyg]

While it is terrible news for TC employees and passengers, what will be the financial impact for airports? How much will airports lose in landing fees and ancillary fees of fuel etc. For airports like LGW where landing slots are in short supply I suppose they will go for a premium and possibly new airlines will access them although there are still strong rumours that IAG will try to bag them. However for Man where there is no shortage of slots this will have a greater impact.

[rferguson]

XL Airways of France has also stopped selling tickets and is expected to follow Thomas Cooks path and to cease trading. Although a much smaller operation (a fleet of just 4 x A330’s) it goes to show how it is a case of survival of the fittest out there now. XL and La Compagnie merged in 2016 so not sure if what’s going on at XL has impacted La Compagnie also.

British Airways cabin crew union BASSA has sent all members an email today along with a crowd funding appeal for Thomas Cook crew.

[SimonS1]

[postquote quote=965898][/postquote]

Assuming you are talking about £200 MILLION….well government ministers have explained today exactly why.

First the government won’t have to pay out £600 million. When ATOL, credit card companies etc have paid out the likely cost to the taxpayer is less than £100 million (slightly different, but I agree it doesn’t make such a great story).

Secondly having done some analysis the government’s view was that a £200 million bailout would not have lasted long. Suppliers have lost confidence and would demand payment in advance. Also the company is saddled by £1.7bn of debt with interest payments of £150 million a year. The role of government is not to finance interest payments to commercial banks.

Thirdly there are strict rules around state aid to businesses, it is far from clear whether this would have met the requirements. And in any case where do you draw the line? Should the government bail out any businesses that make poor decisions and lose money.

Finally some of the shareholders have deep pockets – interesting that Fosun were not willing to come up with the extra £150m (£50m was to come from credit card companies).

Some may call it dogma and pigheadedness, others may just see it as being realistic about a business that sadly just wasn’t viable.

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EU_Flyer, TimFitzgeraldTC, GivingupBA, Montysaurus, tomwjsimpson, mkcol74

[SimonS1]

[postquote quote=965909][/postquote]

Almost certainly the slots and capacity will be picked up by other operators like Jet2.

[SimonS1]

[postquote quote=965908][/postquote]

The airline has applied for a bridging loan. It hasn’t been agreed yet.

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mkcol74

[Johnnyg]

I agree the holiday side will be picked up by Jet 2 or even TUI but for the long haul I can see Virgin taking on some of the long haul routes with possibly EZY or FR picking up some of the smaller routes. Possibly even some of the Chinese airlines looking to access London would also go for slots.Either way it is still sad news for its employees.

[Inquisitive]

It is sad to see Thomas Cook to go. For my first international travel, I used their travellers check. Fond memories.

Now time to time a well managed company suffers from the newly appointed CEO and/or board who either do not have right experience or gung-ho know all type and bring down a perfectly good company. But government cannot support all these misdeeds. Government has only taxpayers money and need to see larger interest.

Although it is sad and very emotional for employees of Thomas Cook, but it is not fair to expect that government will bail the company out.

Nature does not tolerate vacuum, another outfit will cover their business and I hope present Thomas Cook employees will get a job quickly somewhere else.

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ImissConcorde

[rferguson]

The rescue operation looks huge. A couple Malaysian A380’s are even involved. One is due to operate PMI-MAN tonight and tomorrow. With such a large aircraft it is possible to consolidate many flights into one. For example tomorrow one MH A380 is operating PMI-MAN and carrying all pax originally booked on TCX from PMI-MAN/NCL/BHX/LGW.

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mkcol74, AMcWhirter

[AMcWhirter]

That MAS A380 flew empty on Sunday from KUL to MAN

It’s scheduled two operate two round-trips MAN-PMI per day for at least one week.

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mkcol74

[SimonS1]

Whilst in sad circumstances the ability to put together an airlift like this is logistically quite a feat, getting people back without losing too much (of any) of their vacations.

Also sad to hear some hotels have been quite direct in telling people to pay again or leave. On the other hand it appears some hotels have not been paid a € this year yet and are owed huge sums.

[capetonianm]

On the other hand it appears some hotels have not been paid a € this year yet and are owed huge sums.

They negotiated with the operators and if they negotiated badly or did not enforce terms they cannot expect customers who paid in full for their holidays in advance to ‘cough up’ a second time.
I can understand their actions, but it is morally and (probably) legally wrong.

[capetonianm]

This article makes some valid theoretical points, although the author appears to lack knowledge of how things work in real life.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/comment/uk-airline-insolvency-review/?li_source=LI&li_medium=li-recommendation-widget

[Author]

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