Trade calls for more help around failures

Travel agencies have called for greater transparency and speed in the days before a tour operator goes into administration after Berkshire-based Sublime Travel ceased trading last week.

Steve Witt, co-founder of Not Just Travel, and Travel-PA managing director Hamish Kaumaya expressed frustration after the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) confirmed Sublime Travel had failed on January 30.

The luxury operator, which specialised in upmarket holidays, held an Atol for 501 passengers annually, with 158 of these for the quarter to March.

Fears about Sublime grew last week when agents struggled to get through to the operator’s head office and its website homepage was changed to show only its logo. The website has since been taken down.

Witt said: “The lesson from Sublime Travel going into administration is that the whole process needs to be made more transparent and quicker.

“Once a company knows it’s going into administration, our consultants need to be able to take decisive action. We knew about the situation beforehand, and looked after our customers, but we couldn’t officially say we knew about it in case they got a bailout.”

He added: “More needs to be done to shorten the limbo period and uncertainty.”

Last week, a Travel-PA customer was left in the dark about whether his £12,000 holiday to Barbados was going ahead on January 28.

Sublime Travel failed to respond to “numerous” phone calls and text messages sent by Kaumaya and his team.

Travel-PA claims it discovered the client’s booking had not been made when it called the hotel about a separate issue.

Kaumaya called for a helpline to be set up by the CAA to provide agents and customers with information during the “limbo period” before an operator collapses.

CAA Atol spokesperson Andy Cohen said: “We never comment on an existing Atol holder until it is confirmed they cannot meet their liabilities and a formal notice of failure is signed.

“We would be in breach of confidentiality if we were to discuss a company’s affairs before the notice of failure is signed, which is not allowed by the regulations set out in law.

“There would also be concerns about whether this could have anadverse effect on efforts to save the company.”