Travel company says fewer Britons choose EU countries for their holidays

According to Thomas Cook, fewer British holidaymakers have booked summer holidays in the European Union this year, in a climate of uncertainty about Brexit.

According to the travel agency, nearly half (48%) of vacations sold until the end of February were destined for non-European destinations, an increase of 10% over the previous year. 39, last year.

Despite this, the company says that Spain is still its most popular destination.

His findings are consistent with the post office's separate figures showing that foreign exchange sales for long-haul destinations have jumped.

Japanese yen sales have risen 12% since the beginning of the year compared to last year, while those of the Indonesian rupiah have increased 9%, said Post Office Travel Money.

The figures are based on transactions carried out by La Poste from 1 January to 23 April. Swiss Post accounts for around a quarter of UK currency transactions.

According to the same source, the Egyptian pound, which experienced an increase of 687% year-on-year, recorded the strongest growth in foreign exchange sales this year.

Thomas Cook – through which 19 million people book their holidays each year – said that after Spain, Turkey was the most popular destination for its holidaymakers, representing up to now a quarter of his flight bookings only.

Top five destinations this summer

1. Spain
2. turkey
3. Greece
4. United States
5. Cyprus

Source: Thomas Cook, based on bookings made by UK tour operators until February 28th.

Thomas Cook said Tunisia "was doing well" with package bookings in the country twice as high as last year, with flight bookings only quadrupled.

Tourism in the country fell sharply after a terrorist attack in 2015 in the seaside resort of Sousse, in which 30 British tourists and eight others were killed by an armed man linked to the Islamic State.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office lifted its ban on travel to the country last year, prompting British operators to renew flights to Tunisia's Mediterranean coast.

Thomas Cook has issued two profit warnings in the last six months as a result of lower holiday bookings. In March, he detailed the closure of 21 stores across the country and the removal of more than 300 jobs.

The CEO, Peter Fankhauser, said that it was still too early to say that the impact of the UK's exit from the European Union on bookings was postponed until the end of the month of October.

But he said that there "was little doubt that the prolonged uncertainty around how and when the UK's exit from the European Union had led many customers to to put a pause in their holiday plans for this summer. "