Sad times for the Travel Industry

I am sure we have all heard the news now with regards to poor Thomas Cook who sadly went into liquidation this week.

A well known name on the high street and one of the largest travel firms going not just in the UK but in Europe and worldwide went bust after much speculation over the weekend as they could not secure the required £200million needed to guarantee their future.

This is sad not just for the travel industry but the whole country, who all probably enjoyed a Thomas cook holiday or flight at some point in their travels.

Thomas cook was a part of UK history and I can remember well learning of this history when I had my training with them, of how Thomas cook first arranged his first excursion from Leicester to Loughborough.

I was only at Thomas cook for one short year and as we do, met some wonderful life long friends there some of whom still worked at my local Thomas cook in town.

It was reported that Thomas Cook had liabilities amounting upto £1.9 Billion including £388 million still due to hoteliers, hence the reason we saw in the news of tourists being held so called hostages for fear the hotels would not get their money. Which leads onto what the fallout will be as a consequence of this too.  I only hope companies can see their way through this storm as many will have been affected, including P&O cruises who regularly used Thomas Cook flights for their charter fly programme to the Caribbean and the Med.

The effect this will have on us as the public is immense, those who had planned and saved hard for the luxury of a family holiday together, those that worked and committed their lives to working for Thomas cook now jobless, pilots, cabin crew, overseas reps, many devastated by it.

I have seen some lovely stories on social media of people coming together, such as Virgin flying Thomas cook cabin crew back from Florida in upper class free of charge, job offers, applause for the Thomas cook pilots and cabin crew who flew the last flights home. It does bring a tear to the eye as its an end of an era.

Good luck and best wishes to anyone who has been affected by this.