Northern and Western Insurance Company (NWIC) has reinstated its supplier failure cover on Thomas Cook flight-only and accommodation-only sales after the travel giant reached an agreement with its banks.
The supplier temporarily suspended cover last Tuesday when the travel giant postponed the announcement of its annual results. However, Cooks is now back on sale having arranged a £200 million loan facility to take it to April 2013.
NWIC, which supplies members of Hays Travel, Advantage and TTA Worldchoice, took similar action over American Airlines in October amid press reports that the carrier’s parent company AMR was considering entering Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US.
Rival insurance provider IPP said it had continued to cover Cook last week and had no plans to alter its stance. A spokeswoman said: “We would like to confirm that IPP are not taking such action and have not withdrawn cover on any of the policies in respect of Thomas Cook or Thomas Cook Airlines and IPP will continue to support Thomas Cook as they have done for many years.”
Speaking at the weekend, Hays Travel managing director John Hays said his shops, homeworkers and Independence Group members would start selling flight and accommodation-only from yesterday (Monday).
He said: “If Thomas Cook had gone down, the effect throughout Europe would have been massive. It would have taken a lot of UK agents and overseas hotels down with it due to non payment.”