Hotelplan, the umbrella company for Inghams, Ski Total, Esprit and Flexiski, has cut more ski and snowboard holidays this season by reducing the number of ski chalets and chalet hotels on offer. The group has also suspended trips to Finland until next winter due to the ongoing impact of COVID-19.
The announcement has been made in the same week that VIP Ski, another well established and popular chalet operator, has gone into administration and has ceased trading with immediate effect (see details by CLICKING HERE).
Hotelplan UK remains hopeful it can still deliver the remainder of their ski programme once travel restrictions are lifted. Particularly, since the latest COVID-19 vaccine news has seen consumer interest in Inghams’ ski holidays increase by 50%.
Joe Ponte, Hotelplan UK CEO said: “After much consideration, alongside the continual review of the latest restrictions and ongoing impacts of COVID-19 with customer and staff safety in mind, we have sadly decided to remove the chalets and chalet hotels Hotelplan UK manage in France from our 2020/21 winter ski season offering and suspend the Esprit Ski programme in its entirety for this winter.
“Due to the ongoing travel restrictions across the UK and Europe, combined with the unpredictable and constantly evolving situation of COVID-19, we are faced with uncertain operational challenges when it comes to running our successful childcare programmes, chalets and chalet hotels.
“Over the past few months, we’ve been busy reviewing what the chalet and childcare experience would look like and our top priority has always been to keep everyone safe. Whilst the current COVID-19 restrictions remain in place, we will have to make some significant operational changes to our holiday experiences–and we simply cannot guarantee the excellent childcare, great service and welcoming chalet experience that our customers know and love, on certain 2020/21 winter holidays.
“We know that those of our customers impacted will be very disappointed, and it is not a decision we have taken lightly. We have gone on sale early for the winter 2021/22 ski season, and we hope our customers will choose to join us then or pick one of our other hotels or apartments for their ski holiday this season, but if they would prefer to receive a refund, we will arrange this.
“Sadly, following the cancellation of December 2020 departures to Finland, we have also made the difficult decision to suspend the rest of our Finnish programme for this winter. We are hugely disappointed for our customers–and we hope they will choose to join us next year when we kick off the winter with the Lapland adventures they’ve been greatly looking forward to.
We’d like to thank all our customers for their patience and understanding, and I’d like to reassure them that we will continue to look to do the right thing by them.”
Many tour tour operators and resorts are hopeful that the 2020/21 winter ski season will go ahead with a later start and a smaller programme. Inghams and Flexiski are still planning to operate their partner hotels and self-catering apartments across Europe, including those in France. Hotelplan UK chalets previously made up 10% of the overall Inghams’ winter ski programme. Therefore the company believes the reduction on offers still leaves plenty of Inghams accommodation options in operation this season.
From January 2021 onwards, the ski specialists intend to review their upcoming departures on a weekly basis and will postpone taking customer balance payments until 4 weeks prior to departure date until the situation changes.
The Hotelplan announcement followed another recent announcement by the company that it was cancelling all ski holidays in December 2020 – see full story BY CLICKING HERE
Categories: France, Holiday News & Special Offers, News