FTI is cancelling all travel from Saturday 6 July 2024 onwards, affecting around 175,000 holiday packages booked prior to the bankruptcy filing.
Despite intensive efforts and negotiations with various tour operators in the German market, “no satisfactory solution” was found to take over the remaining package holidays that had already been closed, according to the interim insolvency administrator, Axel Bierbach.
Following a corresponding decision by the creditors’ committee on Friday afternoon, the company began informing affected customers and FTI’s service partners, such as travel agencies and hoteliers, about the cancellations. All holiday packages and some individual services, which customers had booked through the insolvent companies FTI Touristik, Big Xtra and through 5 vor Flug, are affected.
Bierbach said that he had “worked very hard with FTI and the German Travel Insurance Fund – DRSF, over the last ten days to find a good solution in the interest of FTI customers and their partners, in order to realise the package holidays that had been booked”.
According to him, DRSF was prepared to settle the existing refund claims in cooperation with one or more competitors. This would allow holidaymakers on a tight budget to travel without having to wait for a refund. “However, this has not been possible,” Bierbach explained.
For customers who have booked package holidays, the move now gives them the opportunity to book their trip with another travel provider immediately. However, for consumers who had booked individual services such as flights, hotels and transfers through FTI, the announcement is bad news as the money they paid is likely to be lost as they are not entitled to a refund for payments already made by DRSF.
According to Mr Bierbach, in recent days, a large number of local FTI companies that take care of hotels and transfers to holiday destinations have withdrawn, meaning that it would no longer be possible to carry out the holiday packages as originally planned. In particular, many hotels no longer felt bound by their agreements with the company due to the insolvency. “In addition, the high dynamics of the travel market and the current competitive situation would have prevented a solution from being found,” Bierbach said.
The decision to cancel all trips “was not taken lightly,” he said.
