Magellan waits on insurance details
Magellan Travel Group will wait for full details of insolvency insurance policies currently being drawn up for travel agents before deciding whether to take out group-wide cover for its members.
UK-based International Passenger Protection (IPP) is working on policies that will provide financial protection for travel agents and consumers in a post Travel Compensation Fund era.
Among the products being developed is Travel Intermediary Insolvency Insurance that will protect consumers in the event of a travel agent or tour operator going under.
Details of the policies and costs involved are expected over the next few weeks.
Magellan chief executive Andrew Macfarlane, who sits on AFTAS’s Travel Industry Transition Plan working party, said its members favoured a group-wide policy.
“IPP will bring products to market and everyone wants the details around that,” he said. “Our members would like us to pursue the intermediary insurance cover and we haven’t made a decision yet whether we will do that on behalf of our members’ or whether they will do it individually.
“We can’t make a decision yet because we are waiting to see the industry solution. But we do believe in intermediary insurance cover.”
Macfarlane said Magellan has been “fully supportive” of AFTA’s reform and of the creation of an accreditation scheme.
He said he was in favour of “industry-wide” insurance cover but confirmed agency groups would be free to create their own schemes.
“We’d be free right now to go off and negotiate with a vendor if we wanted,” he said.
Travel Counsellors has already created its own financial protection scheme for consumers and opted not to join AFTA's voluntary accreditation scheme.
Other networks are understood to be waiting on the finer details of IPP's insurance policies before making a decision on their future plans to protect the travelling public.
Macfarlane added that AFTA believes consumers should not only have to rely on Australian consumer law in the event company failure.
“They wouldn’t be organising this with IPP [if that was the case],” he said.
Email the Travel Weekly team at traveldesk@travelweekly.com.au
afta andrew macfarlane financial ipp magellan protectionLatest News
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