25th Mar 2021 10:50
(Alliance News) - Tui AG on Thursday said summer holiday bookings have been "encouraging" though still massively below pre-pandemic levels, and the tour operator has nudged down its capacity forecasts for the upcoming peak season.
Tui shares were down 3.3% at 366.02 pence each in London on Thursday morning.
The announcement comes as Europe fights a resurgent Covid-19, amid a stuttering inoculation campaign and wrangling over vaccine exports.
Anglo-German Tui said group-wide bookings for summer 2021 are at an "encouraging" level of 2.8 million. This is down 60% from summer 2019, however.
The company added that overall capacity for summer 2021 has been nudged down to 75% of 2019's levels, from the previous forecast of 80%.
"The group remains flexible to increase capacity again in the short term as further progress is made on pandemic response and vaccination campaigns, travel restrictions are lifted and customer demand increases," Tui said.
"Many guests from the UK who had planned a holiday before 17 May 2021 and are affected by the adjusted programme have rebooked for a later travel date in 2021. For example, bookings for October 2021 are up 12% at TUI UK. We continue to see strong pent-up demand and the desire for travel is evident in the UK."
The UK's vaccination campaign, while now faced with fears of supply shortages, has been much faster than mainland Europe's.
The European Union on Wednesday tightened vaccine export controls in a bid to ramp up its stuttering inoculation campaign. Under the EU's new rules, the bloc's European Commission executive will weigh how needy countries are as well as how readily they export doses to the EU before approving shipments.
The move comes amid a dispute between the UK and EU over coronavirus vaccines, with AstraZeneca PLC's jab at the centre of the EU's woes.
By Eric Cunha; [email protected]
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