Thomas Cook collapse leaves 600K in the lurch

LONDON: British travel firm Thomas Cook collapsed on Monday, leaving some 600,000 holidaymakers stranded and sparking the UK’S biggest repatriation since World War II.

The 178-year-old debtplagued group, which had struggled against fierce online competition for some time and blamed Brexit uncertainty for a recent drop in bookings, declared bankruptcy after failing to secure £200 million ($250 million, 227 million euros) from private investors. The Uk-based group is not connected to Thomas Cook India, which is owned at one point but exited seven years ago.

Monday’s bankruptcy, which followed a lengthy period of chronic financial turmoil after a disastrous 2007 merger deal, left some 600,000 tourists stranded worldwide according to Thomas Cook, while its 22,000 staff are out of a job.

The British government launched emergency plans to bring some 150,000 UK holidaymakers back home from destinations including Bulgaria, Cuba, Turkey and the United States.

Authorities have meanwhile launched an official investigation into the corporate collapse, according to a Downing Street spokeswoman who also cautioned that there were “a number of complicated reasons behind the failure”.

Thomas Cook said in a statement that “despite considerable efforts”, it was unable to reach an agreement between the company’s stakeholders and proposed new money providers.

“The company’s board has therefore concluded that it had no choice but to take steps to enter into compulsory liquidation with immediate effect,” it added.

The long-troubled group has also been blighted by enormous costs arising from its disastrous 2007 merger with Mytravel, a deal which left it plagued with huge levels of debt.

The UK government said Monday it had hired planes to fly home British tourists, in a mass repatriation plan codenamed Operation Matterhorn which began immediately.

Launching Britain’s “largest repatriation in peacetime history”, transport secretary Grant Shapps added that the government and UK Civil Aviation Authority had hired dozens of charter planes to fly home Thomas Cook customers.

Both a tour operator and an airline, the travel giant’s key destinations were in Southern Europe and the Mediterranean but it offered also holidays in Asia, North Africa and the Caribbean.

As well as grounding its planes, Thomas Cook has been forced to shut travel agencies, leaving the group’s 22,000 global employees -- 9,000 of whom are in Britain -- out of a job.