Thomas Cook, the world's oldest travel company whose shops have
been a feature of British town centers for generations,
collapsed last month, and its UK business went into liquidation.
Hays Travel will acquire all 555 stores and look to re-employ
former employees from Thomas Cook's retail operations, Britain's
Insolvency Service said in a statement.
"This agreement ... provides re-employment opportunities for a
significant number of former Thomas Cook employees, and secures
the future of retail sites up and down the UK high street," Jim
Tucker, Partner at KPMG, said.
Hays Travel is a private company, jointly owned and managed by
Managing Director John Hays and Chair Irene Hays. The
40-year-old firm based in Sunderland in north-east England
reached sales of more than 1 billion pounds ($1.22 billion) in
2018.
"It is a game-changer for us, almost trebling the number of
shops we have and doubling our workforce - and for the industry,
which will get to keep some of its most talented people," John
Hays said in a statement on the company's website.
Thomas Cook's collapse stranded hundreds of thousands of
holidaymakers around the globe and sparked the largest peacetime
repatriation effort in British history.
Hays Travel has already recruited 421 former Thomas Cook
employees since its collapse, and have made other offers to the
travel firm's former workers, the Insolvency Service said.
Britain has appointed an Official Receiver to try and realize
value from Thomas Cook's assets. KPMG is overseeing the process
at its retail division and aircraft maintenance companies, while
insolvency practitioners from Alix Partners are managing the
liquidation of its airline and tour operator.
(Reporting by Pushkala Aripaka in Bengaluru and Alistair Smout
in London, Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips and Alexander Smith)
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