24 April 2009

Cheers! Harvey World says it's safe and sound

SYDNEY - Harvey World Travel last night hosted a partner cocktail party for 65 leading industry suppliers at its North Sydney offices.

The evening was organised as an introduction for managing director David Rivers to share his vision on the future of HWT.

The pre-arranged event followed a report in The Australian newspaper on the financial viability of the group.

Managing director, David Rivers, who spent the day talking with the media, told the group "the story is dead."

The article has been removed from websites and claims were rectified on radio.

Rivers told the crowd "we are safe, solid and sound and are responding appropriately to the rubbish story. We have already initiated legal communicationÃ¢â¬~.

"This evening is about building on our key relationships and delivering value to our partnerships. We had a very positive outcome from our Christchurch conference and not withstanding today, HWT is back in front.Ã¢â¬~

As TravelMole reader Paul Reeves pointed out to us yesterday, Ã¢â¬Åâœ(Harvey World) travel agencies are independently owned and although part of the Stella group they work under their own brand network and act independently as a chain similar to a franchise but more as a membership agreement.

Ã¢â¬ÅâœWe operate stringent client accounts as a trust account and we do not have any financial ties or dependencies with Stella.

Ã¢â¬ÅâœWe are all independently owned agencies that as a whole have sound financial practices and safeguards in place to protect all our clients, such as registrations with the Travel Compensation Fund.Ã¢â¬~