Latest poll reveals 61% of travel agents will run out of cash by the end of 2020

03 November 2020 – The Advantage Travel Partnership, the UK’s largest travel agent consortium and Travel Gossip, the largest and most active online community for the UK travel industry has found that 61% of travel agents will run out of cash by the end of this year.

The results show the stark reality of how desperate the situation is for travel agents’ businesses and the bleak outlook for the broader travel industry. If blanket travel bans, pointless quarantine measures and lack of testing continues, a further 27% will run out of cash in the first half of next year, resulting in 88% of agents running out of cash before June 2021. This means that there will only be 12% of travel agents still in business by July 2021.

The results from the survey, which were gathered via a Facebook poll on Travel Gossip’s Facebook page received 401 responses within a 24 hour timeframe between 2 – 3 November 2020, following the announcement of a second national lockdown in England. The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) estimates if barriers to global travel remain in place, a total of 2.4 million travel and tourism jobs across the UK could be impacted, with a loss of £124 billion in GDP.

Julia Lo Bue-Said, CEO at The Advantage Travel Partnership said, “When will the government wake up and see that an industry is collapsing in front of them? These results are deeply concerning, but sadly are indicative of many businesses throughout the travel industry. We need an exit strategy from our government to outline how we are going to move forwards. Hospitality and retail had to ensure they were COVID secure when they reopened in the summer, and travel needs its own equivalent – we must have a robust testing system in place and quarantine periods reduced to give us any chance of surviving this crisis. The Global Travel Taskforce is scheduled to present its findings to the Prime Minister in early November, and we are calling on them to progress their discussions as a matter of urgency. This absolutely cannot be delayed otherwise this will have a catastrophic impact on travel agents and the travel industry.”

Bruce Martin, founder at Travel Gossip commented, “It is heart-breaking to hear about so many of our travel agent community on the precipice of closure and financial ruin and these results demonstrate the dire repercussions that this pandemic has had on agents. The second national lockdown and blanket travel ban will only make matters worse as they will have to provide support to travellers who had trips booked and deal with a second round of refunds, putting additional pressure on travel agents who have had little to no revenue since March through no fault of their own.”

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