The suspension of the Tasman travel bubble, alongside the flow-on effects of Covid-linked border closures and restrictions in Australia, make the case for more government support for Australian travel agents and businesses more compelling than ever – and here, two agents explain their need for JobKeeper or something similar.
“We have 25 staff and have been in business for over 25 years,” says Glenn Checkley, managing director of Travelonline, a Brisbane-based online travel agency specialising in family holidays.
“Since the lockdowns in Sydney were announced, our weekly turnover has fallen by over 80% and more importantly, the seasonally important June/July school holiday period was totally wiped out,” Checkley relates.
“Hundreds of bookings for families from Sydney and Melbourne heading to the Whitsundays, Port Douglas and Queenstown NZ, were all cancelled.
“I’m sure we are not the only business based in a non-lockdown area who are severely impacted and not receiving support. We need JobKeeper and rent support back, even if it requires strict turnover reduction tests to ensure the waste of Jobkeeper 1.0 isn’t repeated.
“At the moment businesses like ours are the forgotten businesses.”
Carole Smethurst, managing director of Bicton Travel in Western Australia, echoes the sentiment.
“At least this time last year we were able to sell domestic travel – but now, with the yo-yoing of state border closures, consumers just aren’t confident in booking travel,” Smethurst explains.
“We are in a worse state now than we were at this time last year – at least then we were receiving some government assistance.
“Consumers were happy to shift bookings for 2020 travel forward to 2021 but now they no longer want to do that. They want to cancel because they’re not confident that they will be able to travel.
“I had 29 staff pre-COVID. I’m now down to five full-time and three casuals and I will do whatever is necessary to keep my team together. JobKeeper would allow me to breathe.”
An estimated 15,000 jobs have already been lost in Australia’s travel sector. Support measures anchored to jobs like JobKeeper are needed vitally, given recovery will occur only when international travel again becomes possible for most Australians.
Australia’s travel agents have so far secured an estimated $8 billion worth of credits and refunds for Covid-impacted travel back from hotels, airlines, cruise liners and tour operators for their clients, but there’s still an estimated $2 billion outstanding. This demands time-consuming support – which agents are providing with little-to-no income, following revenue falls of 95% plus as a result of the international travel ban.
“Whichever way you dice it, Australia’s travel agents and businesses are doing it tough,” AFTA Chair Tom Manwaring declares, “and it’s definitely tougher than this time last year when JobKeeper provided structural support in protecting jobs.”
Manwaring continues: “Consumers need us now more than ever to help and we need wider and ongoing government support to be able to support the massive effort being put in right around this country by our travel agents and businesses.
“We are a people business. Right now, every agent is 18 months into near zero income and the lack of cash flow clashes with the ongoing business and payroll costs. We were the first hit and will be the last to recover and, without support, a tipping point on massive job losses is looming. JobKeeper provided a simple, equitable and meaningful solution to protect jobs.”
Edited by Peter Needham
