The head of Thomas Cook has said the inquest into the deaths of two children from carbon monoxide in Corfu was “a trigger point” for a “total change of culture” in the company.
Thomas Cook group chief executive Peter Fankhauser said: “All the mistakes the company made over 10 years fell on us in two weeks.
“Probably Thomas Cook did wrong everything they could do wrong until I decided to talk not about the family but with the family.”
The inquest in Wakefield in May 2015 found Thomas Cook had “breached its duty of care” in the case of children Bobby and Christi Shepherd who died on holiday in Corfu in 2006.
Speaking at the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) Summit in Bangkok, Fankhauser said: “Corfu was a big challenge.
“It was a trigger point for a total culture change at Thomas Cook. I said if we don’t care about the customer the company won’t survive.
“The 22,000 people at Thomas Cook were ashamed of how we behaved. I had the biggest buy-in I ever had in my career in putting the customer at the heart of what we do.”
Asked if Thomas Cook had paid too much attention to legal advice in its handling of the inquest and in the years leading up to it, Fankhauser said: “It is you who has responsibility [as chief executive].
“You have all kinds of advisors in a situation like this, but you have to make the decision. You have the responsibility. Never blame a lawyer.”
Fankhauser said the company had also learned from the inquest in January this year into the massacre of 38 people, mainly UK tourists and customers of TUI, on a beach in Sousse in 2015.
He said Cook had changed the way it imparted Foreign Office advice to customers on potential risks in destinations.
“In the past, we shied away from security and safety topics,” he said. “Now we talk about it and provide information.
“We really put a lot of effort into the information we make available before travel and in training staff.
“We translate the language of advisories into language customers understand, then people can make up their own minds.”
But he said: “We have to rely on government. We are not an intelligence company or a security company. As soon as there is a travel warning we stop flying. It is a clear line.”