AGENTS have hit out at British Airways over the launch of a new service offering loans to customers at its BA Travel Shops.
The airline will offer customers cash amounting to between ú500 and ú15,000 with a 15.9% interest rate levied on regular repayments until the loan is paid off. Alternatively, if a 10% deposit is paid and the remainder of the loan reimbursed within three months, no interest will be charged.
But some agents said the service was simply another attempt by BA to take business away from the trade.
Dave Criddle, from Dave Criddle Travel in Taunton, said he thought the carrier should concentrate on the business of running an airline and looking after those who sell its flights.
He said: “If it kept our commissions up and stopped thinking about all the gimmicks, that would be much better. This gets up my nose. It’s just another marketing ploy – it wants to start thinking about looking after the retailers.”
John Scott, of the Travel Bureau in Newcastle said: “This is another way of getting around the travel agent. We have already lost quite a few of our clients directly to BA through Air Miles and the executive club promotions and now it looks like it is thinking up another way to bypass us.”
The new BA service, called British Airways Travel Finance, is initially available from the Kingston BA Travel Shop but is set to be rolled out to branches in Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh and Leeds shortly.
It is the latest initiative to come out of the carrier’s financial services division which was set up in 1996 to provide travel insurance, travellers’ cheques and foreign currency. BA has linked up with First National Tricity Finance, a subsidiary of Abbey National, to provide the service.
The airline’s director of marketing Martin George said: “BA is the first airline to pioneer travel loans and we think it’s a unique service which will make planning a flight or holiday easier than ever before.”
Lunn Poly introduced a loan system with Lombard in 1995/1996 but it was later dropped.