I thought MyTravel were skint?!? Does this mean that they will eventually become one company with one brochure and less choice?

It appears that if the sale (- or indeed A sale, since others are also in the frame including TCX and TUI - goes ahead,) that it is not the entire First Choice Group of companies that is for sale, purely the "mainstream" business. This is probably the FC package holiday arm and airline. Quite how Sovereign, H&J, Sunsail etc is affected is anyone's guess.........

Since FCA have trimmed and rationalised the company over a number of years and will make an overall profit this year in a really cut-throat business (winter results were a loss as usual, but full year will reverse this) and MYT are still very much in an increasing debt spiral, the reasoning behind all of this is unclear. Just wish I'd bought some MYT shares when they were down to the 20p mark a few years ago!!!

At the end of the day I suppose the shareholders and directors of both companies (whichever they are) will be making a healthy profit and the employees will get shafted (salaries,seniority,contracts and pensions!), and I can see very little benefit to the customers either.................

It is indeed the airline that I am worried about as I have only booked flights not the entire holiday. I chose FCA as it appeared their long haul flights were really good and did compare to some scheduled flights. I hope that if something does happen with this sale then it is not in the near future. If my choice of flight does change and also the service that
I wanted, I will cancel. What would be the chance of getting all my money back I wonder??

i to hope this does not happen soon as we are going to the dominican next year with firstchoice and dont want to travel with mytravel.
we booked for the aircraft with it being a 9 hour flight and the better half not liking to fly.

I work for First Choice and as far as we have been told, we are purely in a talking stage and may amount to nothing. As far as I am aware, at the moment, Mytravel cannot afford the sort of money First Choice are asking for.
As it stands, First Choice are looking to offload their "mainstream" business - the Majorcas, Ibizas etc. Its such a saturated market with the budget airlines being here and with a lot of people doing DIY its difficult to understand how anyone can make money to these destinations.
First Choice, unlike a lot of tour operators is a profit focussed company. They arent really interested in being the biggest and best, if it makes money thats where we want to be. And lets face it, when you look at the holiday complaints about First Choice, they are mainly about European holidays, very little about our Long Haul product, Hayes & Jarvis, Sovereign etc.
So why not concentrate on something that you do well and makes you lots of money? - makes perfect businesss sense to me. And as far as the staff goes, yes there will probably be job cuts, mergers, rebranding - ive been in this job 20 years and gone through about 6 of these so far - but the travel trade is all about re-inventing itself and anyone who works in this industry should be used to this kind of change.
So who knows what First Choice will be this time next year - whatever it will be im sure it will be a higher quality product making good money and just that little bit different to the norm.

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Thank you for that happening, it eases a bit of worry. Im terrified of flying and I chose the SCP in First Choice in the hope of easing the problem, I would really hate to lose that. I have been banging on to anyone who will listen about how brilliant it sounds I just hope it will be.

Hi
One of the biggest assets First Choice has at the moment are their Long Haul flights, I would find it VERY UNLIKELY that they are seeking to offload these aircraft to another operator. HOWEVER if they did then the new operator would certainally not change the level of service onboard - it would be complete madness as I think we have proved, there are people out there that would be prepared to pay for that bit of quality than be stuck in cattle class!
Star Class Premier is fantastic by the way (not being biased at all) but I flew to Mexico in June for my honeymoon - definately got that wow factor if all you have ever flown before is "bog standard charter!!" - read the reviews under the airlines section to see what people are saying!
Craig

But the airline ARE part of the mainstream operation - and as pilots/cabin crews etc ALL fly long-haul and shorthaul (shorthaul only on the smaller airbus fleet) - the planes and the crews are likely to go with the sale!!! It would not be feasible or cost effective to keep a few aircraft back for long-haul only - otherwise they would already be operating a long-haul only fleet........... What will happen to the options FCA have on the 787 is anyone's guess. Florida etc are already in "mainstream" brochures - so it is not just restricted to European work - purely the "non-specialist" markets - those things that are branded "First Choice".

H&J etc have been moving gradually towards the scheduled airline market, despite the new Star Class service and I fear that star class premier is going to be caught up in the mess that all of this will create.

At best it won't happen and the staff and customers will have a few months of worry while it all settles down. My gut feel is still with TCX, who certainly have more available cash than MYT, - the FCA board are obviously just sounding out the options.............

i would hate for any travel company to take over first choice as we have travelled twice a year since 2003 and have had very good service(except the year i travelled to ibiza without my husband,me 4 kids one of which was 2 in a buggy, 3 cases and the rep ignored me and helped a woman who was with her husband and left me to strugglle alone you know who you are )my kids always say are we going on the flower plane we did fly with my travel in october and i have to say no complaints,but we have booked florida flights for 2007 and grand canaria package alsowith eclipse/first choice (im not rich,just obsessed with booking holidays).if tui get hold of the company i will probably never be able to afford to go on holiday again,they are an excellent company,but if you have 4 children like myself they are very expensive,compared with first choice etc.i say dont sell mo

Im sure whatever happens the customer will see little or no difference in the products on offer - probably the biggest difference you will see will be a re-branding excersise - however IF Mytravel were to take First Choice over, they may even leave the name alone like they have done with Aspro, Panoranma and Manos etc.....
Its just another merger / take over that may happen in the travel trade and im sure there will be more. Saying that, First Choice may end up taking over someone else - thats not been ruled out either!!!
Who knows, we can all sit here and only speculate and guess at the moment - lets leave it up to the bigwigs to decide eh....Im sure Peter Long and his merry men know what they are doing!!!

Hi,
Back in July i booked a holiday for my parents with First Choice to go to Cyprus in Aug '07.
Since then my dad has been diagnosed with a seriuos illness and will not be able to go.
The deposit of £260 has already been paid.
Because the holiday isn't until next year, they hadn't taken out insurance yet.

Can someone please advise me on what the cancellation charges would be?

thanks in advance
Stevei

I think you will find it is loss of the deposit (£260) stevei. Shame they did not get the insurance sorted out.

If you explain the circumstances, FC may agree to defer the paid deposit to another booking, perhaps the following winter season, or summer 2008, but they would be under no obligation to do so.

Hi
On every flight ive been on with they sell scratch cards on journey home. Has anyone ever won? I usually buy a couple but wonder if anyone ever wins a holiday etc

Hi Stevei

Up to 57 days before departure it is just the deposit that is lost, after that it changes depending on the number of days prior to departure that you cancel.

If you scroll down THIS page until the CHANGES TO YOUR BOOKING 'If You Make Changes' section you will find the full information and also the relevent cancellation dates.

You could try explaining the situation to them and see if they can help you.

Graham

First Choice confirms £108m laterooms.com purchase

First Choice has strengthened its online businesses with the £108 million purchase of http://www.laterooms.com.

The late availability site with more than 13,000 mainly UK hotels is expected to make a profit of £6.2 million in 2006 and accounts for 12% of the intermediary online hotels booking sector at about 1.3 million bednights.

First Choice chief executive Peter Long said: "Operating in a high growth sector, we see considerable opportunity to increase Laterooms future profitability even further. It has a distinct business model servicing a niche market segment at low cost.

"The access to an increased range of accommodation already available in the group will strengthen its position and give international scalability."

First Choice estimates the UK hotel market to be worth £12 billion a year, of which £8.2 billion comes from the domestic source market, with 20% of customers booking online.

With permission from Travelmole

Hi

Ive just been on the first choice website to book a holiday and ive noticed theyve reduced there premium baggage allowance to 23k from 30k but not the price has anyone else noticed this.

Yes I noticed it too Mari - I wonder if it changed around the time British Airways were changing their regulations.

Kathx

We are flying from Bristol - Alicante on Sat18th Aug with First choice on flight FCA7642, when booking it flight times were 06.00 after looking at Bristol airport website yesterday that flight is now showing as 14.40 and even worse the return flight FCA7643 originally coming home on Sat1st Sept at 10.25am is now showing as Sun 2nd Sept at 10.25 am. The flights left at that time yesterday so I phoned first choice and asked if it was getting changed, well they kinda said dont bother with Bristol airport doesnt matter what it says on there the flight times are still the same as when we booked. Does anybody know if the flight times will end up being changed and a really stupid question now if they do change them would we be thrown out our room at midday on the Saturday? Thanks in advance for any help.

I just came back from a holiday from cyprus with first choice and had a lovely time. However, First Choice seemed to do everything they possibly could to ruin it and I certainly won't use them again. Also went on my honeymoon with first choice to the Dominican Rep in the summer and had some negative experiences with them as well.

1. Took flight from Gatwick to DR - Star class premier. At check in we were informed a stop off at antigua would happen. Not on our ticket. When arrived at antigua we were left for two hours on the plane without being allowed off, no refreshments, very uncomfortable etc. When we took off eventually the crew refused to open the bar to supply refreshments and only gave water to stop a potential riot!

2. Reps who are non-existent within resort. All the other operators seem to have their reps around. Where were FC's?

3. Flight to Cyprus - crammed in like sardines. I am 6' 3 which I don't think is excessively tall but could not physically get into the seat and had to stand for the majority of the journey

4. Were telephoned to offer a great price late check out of £34 which we took as our flight home was at 3.00 am. Got to the hotel and were told the price for late checkout was £15CY about £17. When questioning FC about the price were told it was down to exchange rates.

I for one am fed up with First Choice doing things to cut their costs and make money unscrupulously. I will build my own holidays using scheduled flights in future. Pressure sales and lack of information also really hack me off.

3.