Budget tour firm Holidays 4U bust

About 13,000 tourists will be repatriated after Brighton-based firm goes into administrationThe summer plans of more than 60,000 holidaymakers were thrown into chaos on Wednesday after the British tour operator Holidays 4 UK collapsed.The end of the company has prompted the industry's safety net, the Civil Aviation Authority's Atol consumer protection scheme, to arrange the transfer of about 13,000 holidaymakers who are already abroad in Turkey.A further 50,000 people have been told their holidays are cancelled.Some passengers at Manchester airport Wednesday, were prevented from boarding a flight to Dalaman, southern Turkey."There will be people turning up expecting to go, who won't be going anywhere," a spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority said on Wednesday. "It is very unfortunate."The collapse of Holidays 4 UK, which specialises in holidays to Turkey, and which also traded as Aegean Flights, follows two weeks after the firm reported a near-tripling of profits and after its managing director, Nuri Mete Faks, claimed that he was "confident of success in 2011 and onwards".The company's accounts, filed on 20 July, show the company made pre-tax profits of �326,270 in the year to the end of October 2010.Travellers who are now on holiday will be repatriated to the UK by the CAA.Those who have booked and paid for holidays to come will find their trips cancelled, but they will be entitled to compensation under the Air Travel Organisers' Licensing scheme, Atol.The rescue will cost the CAA about �9.5m, of which about �4.5m will be covered by Atol bonds and other security measures lodged by Holidays 4 UK. The rescue fund, which is already �42m in deficit, will be pushed a further �5m into the red by the latest collapse.It will put pressure on the CAA to increase its �2.50 levy on all package holiday bookings so as to put the repatriation fund on a better financial footing.Holidays 4 UK, which is owned by two Turkish-British families and has been trading from Brighton for 17 years, is now being run by PricewaterhouseCoopers administrators."The company has suffered because of the difficulties faced by the travel industry during 2010 and 2011, as a result of the economic downturn," said Ian Oakley-Smith, joint administrator and director at PwC. "The director has determined that the business is no longer able to trade and placed the company into administration. The company will cease operating with immediate effect."An Atol spokesman said: "There is never a good time for a travel firm to fail. Unfortunately the height of summer is the worst possible time."It is unusual for a travel business to fail so early in the peak summer season when cash inflows are traditionally at their strongest. Holidays 4 UK's failure was reportedly triggered by dire trading in May, June and July. .Also trading as Holidays 4U, the company flew from a number of UK airports, including Belfast, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Gatwick and Glasgow.Last year another Turkish budget holiday specialist, Goldtrail, based in Wimbledon, south London, collapsed in July, also appointing administrators from PwC. This failure provided a temporary boon for Holidays 4 UK.The company Holidays 4 UK said in its annual report recently: "[Faks] is confident of success in 2011 onwards in view of the failure of the company's two major competitors during the summer of 2010. He considers that the next year will show a consolidation in the market place before sales grow significantly".The company had a turnover of �35m a year and was licensed to carry 100,000 passengers under the Atol scheme. Most of the Brighton-based company's 18 staff have been made redundant now.The collapse came on the same day that Thomas Cook, a much bigger tour operator, announced another dire trading up date, following three recent profits warning, and its chief executive resigned. The company said Manny Fontenla-Novoa had left Thomas Cook "with immediate effect"."The board felt that Manny should take responsibility for recent events, and accepted his resignation," a company insider explained.Travel & leisureTurkeyTurkeySimon BowersRupert Neateguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

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