2nd Nov 2015 15:11
LONDON (Alliance News) - Thomas Cook Group PLC was "slow" and "insufficient" in its handling of the deaths of two children at one of the travel company's holiday resorts nine years ago, according to an independent report.
Bobby and Christi Shepherd died from carbon monoxide poisoning caused by a faulty boiler at the Louis Corcyra Beach Hotel in Corfu during a holiday the family had booked with Thomas Cook in October 2006.
The travel operator has been heavily criticised for the way it has handled the situation since, leading to an investigation being conducted by former J Sainsbury PLC Chief Executive Justin King.
In his report, commissioned by Thomas Cook, King found the travel firm had been slow to respond to the children's deaths and that the group's health and safety strategy has "significant shortcomings". He also said that the company lacked compassion in the way it dealt with the children's parents and accused it of being too concerned about the legal implications resulting from the incident rather than "human considerations".
"Decisions were often not taken in the thoughtful and caring way you would expect from a company such as Thomas Cook," King said.
"The fact that this tragic situation spanned almost nine years is testimony to how much the
legal, rather than the human considerations dominated the landscape," he added.
King notes that while the company did reach out to the family several times over the years, its approaches were "intermittent, sometimes ill-timed and often ill-judged".
"Conversely approaches from the family met with untimely and somewhat abrupt response, or, in the case of Mr Shepherd?s attempts to arrange a meeting with the company in 2013, no response at all," King said.
However, while the investigation found that Thomas Cook's health and safety strategy had significant shortcomings in its implementation, King did say that "clear action plans" are now in place to address these issues.
He noted that the health and safety function and its leadership have been "much changed and
improved" within the last two years, but that there is still more to do.
"In culture terms it is my assessment that it is still the belief that it is the health and safety teams that 'do' health and safety. There is a long journey ahead to embed in the culture the idea that it is the universal responsibility of all colleagues," King said.
The report also noted that dealing with customer complaints across the business is "neither adequate or consistent".
"On the whole, however, as I have observed much has been done to move in the right direction, in particular in the last year. But it is clear that to date the actions have been insufficient or progress has been slow, no doubt partly due to the size and complexity of the business," King said.
King highlighted that Thomas Cook needs to focus on the three main areas of health and safety, risk and audit, and customer experience, in order to improve relations with customers.
"If the ambition to place the customer at the heart of the business is to be achieved, these functions need to be empowered, resourced and supported in a way that is not sufficiently evident at present," he said.
"Thomas Cook is beginning to be a 'learning' organisation. It is listening to customers and colleagues and has started to respond with pace and vigour. This was not always the case in the past. There remains much to do to embed this approach," King added.
In response to the report, Thomas Cook said it acknowledged that while it "makes uncomfortable reading in parts", it accepts the findings and is committed to learning from them.
The travel operator confirmed that it will increase investment in customer service, increase the number of overseas staff and invest in equipment and training for those staff, review its health and safety audit policy, and introduce customer satisfaction as a core key performance indicator of the management performance review.
It also will commit to lead carbon monoxide awareness initiatives in the travel industry through the Safer Tourism Foundation, established by the company with a GBP1 million initial investment, in collaboration with Bobby and Christi's mother Sharon Wood.
"I would like to thank Justin King for his work, which will serve as a catalyst to further accelerate the changes we are making to put the customer at the heart of our business. With the implementation of our new operating model, we will remove the last silos in our different businesses and work together as one organisation to deliver a consistent customer experience," Chief Executive Peter Fankhauser said in a statement.
Fankhauser was appointed chief executive in November 2014.
"My priority is to drive this reorganisation as quickly and effectively as possible. Booking a holiday is a matter of trust and it is our duty to do everything we can to justify the trust our customers place in us, both now and in the future. We have achieved much already, but there is certainly much more to do. I am confident we are on the right path," he added.
Shares in Thomas Cook were trading down 0.3% at 122.50p Monday afternoon.
By Karolina Kaminska; [email protected] @KarolinaAllNews
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