THOMAS Cook has delayed the debut of its new booking system for its partner ARTAC agents until summer 2001.
The consortium was due to receive an adapted version of Rio 2 within 12 months but complications in the development of the system have delayed the plan by a further year.
ARTAC chairman Colin Heal said: “Of course, we would have liked Rio sooner but Thomas Cook has said that it needs more time to work on the system.
“It was developed for a multiple but clearly their needs differ from those of independent agents. It’s fair to say it will take more work than Thomas Cook anticipated.”
As an interim measure, ARTAC has negotiated a deal with ICC Travel Systems enabling Worldchoice agents to either lease or buy the system. Heal denied agents that buy ICC will not bother to invest in Rio 2 once it is available.
“It is such a state-of-the-art system that I am confident our agents will go for it,” he said.