Abta said people still wanted to go on holiday but the industry expected a difficult summer. Photograph: Maria Galan/AlamyView image in fullscreenAbta said people still wanted to go on holiday but the industry expected a difficult summer. Photograph: Maria Galan/AlamySummer holiday bookings down amid ‘apprehension’, says UK travel industryFears about the Middle East conflict, cost of living and EU border checks are leading people to delay their decisions
Holiday bookings for early summer have been hit by uncertainty around the conflict in the Middle East and the rising cost of living, the travel industry has said.
Mark Tanzer, chief executive of the UK travel association Abta, said that while people still wanted to go on holiday, the industry was bracing for a difficult summer.
“There is evidence from our research that apprehension generally, and the rising cost of living here, are dampening early-season booking levels,” he said at the organisation’s annual Travel Matters conference in London.
Nervous consumers are increasingly booking their holidays later in the year, amid fears around the impact of the conflict in the Middle East on travel. The war has triggered a rise in global oil prices, with jet fuel costs jumping even more sharply and bringing the prospect of higher air fares. However, large numbers of flights have not been cancelled during the lucrative summer holiday season, as had been feared.
Tanzer said the new EU entry/exit system (EES), which has triggered long delays at some big airports on the continent, could also hurt demand. The rules require passengers from non-EU countries to register their personal information and biometrics at the border.
“The rollout of the EU entry/exit system … is creating an unhelpful, and potentially damaging, backdrop for summer travel to EU destinations,” he said. “There clearly are some hotspots, and we urge destinations to use the contingency flexibility allowed under the regulation to suspend the biometric registration where queues are unacceptably long.”
View image in fullscreenThe new EU entry/exit system ‘is creating an unhelpful, and potentially damaging, backdrop for summer travel’, said Mark Tanzer, of Abta. Photograph: Davide Bonaldo/Sopa/LightRocket/GettyIn May, French police temporarily suspended the extra checks at the port of Dover. The Greek tourism minister, Olga Kefalogianni, told the BBC that Greece would suspend biometric checks for British travellers until September to prevent summer disruption.
Uku Särekanno, a director at Frontex, the European border and coastguard agency, said it could take “one or two years” for the EES to stabilise, as people went through the system for the first time and then in the future were able to go through a fast-track check.
The warning from Abta comes as airlines and holiday operators face an uncertain summer, the most important season for profits in the industry.
Shaun Morton, chief executive of the holiday operator On the Beach, also speaking at the Abta conference, said that while bookings had been coming in, shorter lead times “creates uncertainty and makes planning difficult”.
“We have a price-sensitive and uncertain consumer who was already booking on a later booking curve, who is now also concerned about coming out of this war – more inflation, fuel shortages and fuel surcharges,” he said.
However, he still expected the summer travel market to grow overall this year. “This late loop will eventually reverse when the conditions allow it to,” Morton said. “This is cyclical … where people do miss out on their holiday this year, I’m sure they will make sure they don’t miss out on it next year.”
Shares in On the Beach have fallen 30% this year, including a sharp drop last month, when the group warned that holidaymakers were booking later this year.
