Tuesday, February 23, 2021
Bookings increase by 500 percent
Britons rush into vacation planning
If everything goes according to plan, almost all corona restrictions will be lifted in Great Britain from the end of June. An extended summer vacation seems feasible again: Many British people book flights into the European sun for July to September. But there are still some hurdles to overcome.
Many Britons booked vacations after the official opening plan was announced. The low-cost airline Easyjet announced that flight bookings had tripled compared to the previous week. The airline also counted more than six times as many travel bookings. Destinations in Spain such as Malaga, Alicante and Palma, Faro in Portugal and destinations in Greece such as the island of Crete were in demand. The world's largest tour operator TUI also saw a booking increase of 500 percent overnight. TUI boss Fritz Joussen recently predicted a travel boom in the summer.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson presented a four-step plan on Monday. After this, almost all corona restrictions will lapse from the end of June if the infection situation allows it. Great Britain is hardest hit by the pandemic in Europe, but already furthest with the Covid vaccination campaign.
Travel warnings? Quarantine?
Airlines and travel events have high hopes for the summer travel season after their business has largely been on the floor since the outbreak of the corona pandemic a year ago. Shares in airlines and tour operators rose sharply on the London Stock Exchange: Easyjet gained more than nine percent. The British-Spanish aviation group IAG and TUI rose by six percent.
As Easyjet further explained, most bookings were received for August, followed by July and September. At TUI, hotels and resorts in Spain, Greece and Turkey were in high demand from July. It remains to be seen how the British government will proceed with the travel warnings.
So far, most travel destinations are still banned until May 17th. The government has announced a reassessment for April 12th. Airlines and tour operators hope that the dissuasive ten-day quarantine requirement after the return trip will no longer apply. In addition, the destination countries would have to lift British entry bans that France and Spain had imposed because of the presumably more contagious virus mutation in Great Britain.
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