Everyone on a package holiday is fine (tell them to enjoy it), they’ll get home on or about the day they were meant too. They may land at a different airport but will have transport arranged.
Those on flight only are worse off but as has happened previously the other airlines will have cheap “rescue” flights available to anyone who has a TC booking.
The people to feel sorry for are the employees.
I have flights arranged for next year and have just completed the forms for a credit card chargeback. Not the end of the world and now just need to wait for easy jet to release there flights.
It's all 'cuz Brexit innit bruv..
Zee LINKYThomas Cook plunges on debt concerns
Mark Wembridge and Roger Blitz
November 22, 2011
Shares in Thomas Cook Group slumped by more than 70 per cent on Tuesday after the struggling tour operator admitted it was having to renegotiate the terms of its gross debt burden for the second time in just over a month. The company is seeking a further £100m from a syndicate of 17 banks, including the UK’s four large high street lenders. Last month, the tour operator announced it had agreed a £100m loan deal with the syndicate, which it had hoped would end speculation that it might breach its banking covenants. Sam Weihagen, interim chief executive, said trading since the group’s end of year in September had been worse than expected, piling further pressure on Thomas Cook’s cash flow during the slow winter booking season. “We have seen some deterioration in our trading post the year-end, and that has put pressure on our cash and liquidity position,” Mr Weihagen said. He blamed the group’s lack of bookings on the eurozone crisis and a sluggish recovery in tourism to the Middle East and north Africa. The shares in Europe’s second-biggest tour operator closed 75.2 per cent down at 10.2p, giving it a market capitalisation of £89m. Fitch, the rating agency, placed Thomas Cook on negative watch. Thomas Cook’s net debt at the end of September was just less than £900m. According to Nick Batram, analyst with Peel Hunt, Thomas Cook’s debt position, including its pension deficit, could peak at £2bn.
Fas est ab hoste doceri
How can Tui get it so right and Thomas Cook so wrong. They are essentially doing the same thing
https://www.tuigroup.com/en-en/media...al-report-2018
Hopefully the directors will be disqualified, to continue trading at such a loss with no plan for so long, unbelievable from people on six figure (or more) salaries.
I think they always had a plan, it just didn`t work. There was a point where the company seemed to be recovering and the share price recovered somewhat (around 2012 I think) but the recovery wasn`t sustainable and the company continued to struggle.
Once I realised I`d lost most of my investment I stopped following the story, the chance to bail out had gone. Investing in shares carries risk, overall I`ve well but there have been winners and losers, you have to accept it. Ironically, at the time I bought in I was torn between Thomas Cook and TUI......wrong call! Both had been paying good dividends and that's what I was seeking. Thankfully I didn`t invest much (relatively) but it's still a loss, even though I`d mentally written the money off I`d always hoped there would be some recovery and value somewhere down the line.
Was due to fly out to Turkey this morning at 6:05.
Booked through TC so ATOL covered.
Ended up having to find a last minute deal at 5am this morning. Now going to Spain tomorrow morning.
Sad times and feel so sorry for the staff.
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My son and his family were flying to Lanzarote next month on Thomas Cook.
He's had to belt around to get flights via EasyJet as they have a villa in the kids school holidays.
Cheers,
Neil.
Flew back from Turkey Saturday night with TC so just got in before the chaos.
Clearly you are more interested in political statements than in facts....
TC's financial challenges started in earnest after the merger with MyTravel back in 2007. The company took on a great deal of debt, and the interest payments have been killing them in a very competitive market. Now, if you can link that with Brexit, which started 3 years ago, I'll be very surprised indeed....
Nobody has blamed Brexit exclusively for TCs demise, it has however been a factor. Its not the whole story, but is a factor. https://www.theguardian.com/business...ok-debt-brexit
“There is now little doubt that the Brexit process has led many UK customers to delay their holiday plans for this summer,” said the chief executive, Peter Fankhauser ,in May. That account chimed with rivals’ and it’s possible that uncertainty around the latest Brexit deadline of 31 October infected the banks’ mood. So, yes, one can say Brexit helped to push an already teetering Thomas Cook closer to the edge.
Cheers..
Jase
Jason
Your point is entirely well-made, and I accept that Brexit has been an influence.......but it is not the prime factor in TC's sad demise.
In May of this year, Thomas Cook reported a £1.5bn loss for the first half of its financial year, with £1.1bn of the loss caused by the decision to write down the value of My Travel, the business it merged with in 2007. That's a large proportion of its debt.....
I thought the rather glib 'Welcome to Brexit Britain everyone. Get used to it.' to be inappropriate......and reacted accordingly!!
This is a pretty well-balanced article in my view: https://news.sky.com/story/the-mills...lapse-11817610
It's the workers I feel really sorry for.....but I also have great sympathy for those whose travel and holidays have been disrupted.
Last edited by Pete D; 23rd September 2019 at 15:53.
News saying it will take up to 2 weeks to repatriate all customers, I guess that’s if they choose to wait
My wife’s office is over the road from TC in Peterborough. She said last week was a bit of a media frenzy due to the likelihood of it happening, and today there’s been a lot of despondent (now ex-) employees being hounded by the media for quotes
It’s been kind of heartwarming to see so many businesses who are close to TC offices/callcenters redefine their job vacancies as being only for folks who’ve just lost their jobs with TC.
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I’ve read in the press that Virgin are flying back people home for free regardless of their insurance / ATOL position which is an admirable thing to do.
I had a two week all inclusive holiday booked with the other half to depart at the end of October. All ATOL protected but it’s going to be at least 2 months from processing the claim when the refunds will be processed. The specific website for Thomas Cook ATOL Claims opens next Monday.
Spot on
They bought the failed Airtours renamed it MyTravel and it turned out to be the equivalent of what House of Fraser is to Ashley
They then bought Co-Op travel with all its high st stores when the travel business was going online.
Wrote off nearly a billion but left with 1.6 BILLION of debt borrowed from our nationalised banks Lloyds & RBS at err allegedly stiff rates ....
Interest on debt was payable at 3’000’000 per week which takes some funding and finding Q4 is an outflow month so screwed.
Very sad for all customers but extremely sad for employees.
The redundancy bill will be massive and the payments office haven’t caught up with Carrilion yet....
We have a Caribbean cruise booked in for November. We fly BA then jump on a Princess ship, all booked via Thomas Cook. I have contacted both BA and Princess and thankfully both have assured us our holiday is safe. It must be awful for those less fortunate though, along with the workers of Thomas Cook who are now jobless.
Stuart
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I didn’t realise they were 1.5 billion in debt,I still don’t get how this can happen,whoever is borrowing surely need looking at ,how is any company gonna turn that into a profit .
I’m sure there will of been some fat cats on serious dollar ,as long as there ok that’s all that matters.
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You are correct. They have 581.
https://www.tui.co.uk/shop-finder/directory
Unwind with a pint or two in our own virtual pub. Friendly banter and clean jokes please and no politics or religion.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-fund-windfall
Interesting read and poses a lot of questions.
Zee LINKYA furious Thomas Cook customer has blasted the stricken tour operator after she paid £2,000 to book her first ever holiday to Turkey before the firm collapsed.
The customer, who said she was set to travel with her mother and sister in May, hit out at Thomas Cook and warned: 'I better get my money back or I'll go off.'Speaking to an LBC reporter, the woman who was not named, said angrily: 'I want to see what's going to happen with my money. I better get it back or I'll go off. I better get it back I'm telling you.'
£2,000 for holiday in Turkey.. and the muppets still managed to go tits up with customers like that.. I am in the wrong business, I'm telling you.
Last edited by VDG; 23rd September 2019 at 18:24.
Fas est ab hoste doceri
Thomas Cook passengers won't be out of pocket due to the EU Package Travel directive. Lucky the failure of Thomas Cook which 'wasn't caused by Brexit' didn't happen after Brexit eh.....
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My Daughter Partner and our Grandaughter were due to fly out to Turkey Oct 15th.Obviously cancelled so we've paid 2k for another Holiday a few hours ago.
It won't be the last of the airlines to fold,get ready for more of the same over the next 10 years.Budget airlines will be the ones to drop out once the Worlds governments clamp down on them with huge hikes on green tax tightening their profits even more.
It will go full circle eventually with air travel becoming once again the privilege of the wealthy.Not much has been thrown out there about the pollution from aircraft at the moment,certainly not as much as land based vehicles!.For those that aren't aware just search "flightradar24" and expand it to show live air traffic then imagine this 24/7 365!.
It can't and won't be sustainable.
Sad jobs have gone for sure,but aside from the jobs lost IMO better in the long term,and remember it is the weakest that fall & or cease trading.
It will be harder for the majority to move into other work,but the Chairman and Directors will be cushioned with their 20 million bonuses!.But we don't talk about that do we.Perhaps a public school boy mate will have them at the helm of another blue chip company.
Its perfectly balanced IMO,but your certainly welcome to have your own too.I work closely with Pilots everyday in my job and hear quite a lot about what's happening before most.
And another airlines predicaments months before the threat of strikes and reduction of flights.
But do watch this space very closely in the coming years re airlines...Budget airlines.
Last edited by P9CLY; 23rd September 2019 at 19:41.
Pollution played no part in TC's demise, but you seem to suggest it will play out for others? There has been plenty of publicity about air travel and pollution.
Strikes are pay and conditions issues?
The TC business model killed them in the end.
I often talk to the Postman and he has always got lots to say about the woes of the Post Office but I not usually convinced he has a handle on the running of the PO.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
I didn't say pollution was the downfall of "this" airline as you rightly stated,it will eventually see more airlines fail(budget airlines) because of the pollution concerns globally.Although as you again stated plenty has been discussed re air pollution,nothing has yet been done to make a start to any degree to make any impact whatsoever!.
What I'm saying is,when the worlds governments do get to grips with the situation,although like most things it's a hike in charges/taxes which doesn't really do much in terms of the pollution!,but it will see some budget airlines start to fail with taxes imposed on them with business falling.
You like I have an opinion,I'm not here to play ping pong,so with that I'll read your replies otherwise we'll be on the hamsters wheel!!.
ATB.
You have to wonder what is going on, they're talking about 'repatriation' costs of up to £600 million to fix this issue, TC required £200 million to stay afloat and continue as a going concern, so at what point has the costs spiraled, talk of 'limited aircraft' to carry out the movement of people, but what about the aircraft that were going to move the people in the first place, have the spaces disappeared, has the TC fleet disappeared, etc, etc?
It'll not be a good time for a while i think for a lot of people, you have quite a lot who have spent a fortune and had their dreams dashed, and on the flip side you'll have every carpetbagger trying to get a claim in or make something out of others misery, how long until the first class action or PPI company to change to TC claims?!