UK lagging behind with growth in long-haul bookings
Latest figures from ForwardKeys shows the UK is lagging behind other European markets when it comes to growth in long-haul outbound travel.
But with the pound weakened against other currencies the UK is enjoying major growth in inbound travel.
ForwardKeys, which predicts future patterns by analysing 16 million booking transactions a day, reports that global long-haul air travel bookings for June, July and August are 6.4% up on where they were at the same time last year.
But a break-down shows that while the US and Germany are both more than 8% ahead, France is 5.4% ahead, Australia is 6.3% ahead and Canada is 2.6% ahead, the UK is only 0.1% up on last year.
Meanwhile, the US is the major country where bookings for the summer are behind where they were last year, 3.5% behind.
"By contrast, the UK, assisted by a collapse in the value of sterling following the vote to leave the EU, is ahead 18%," said ForwardKeys.
"All the other major destinations are experiencing strong booking interest. Summer bookings for Italy are 6.8% ahead, for Spain 13% ahead, for France 7.3% ahead and for Thailand 3.2% ahead.
"Looking at major destinations, which comprise 1.5% or more of the worldwide market, the hottest of all are Greece 21.8% ahead, Indonesia 17.4% ahead, Russia 16.7% ahead and Portugal 14.8% ahead."
CEO Olivier Jager added: "Except for inbound travel to the US, we are currently looking at a good year for travel, with more people than ever being willing to fly long haul for their summer holidays."
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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