Thousands of travel vouchers not guaranteed against bankruptcy: Consumers' assoc.

Potentially thousands of ANVR travel vouchers for "package holidays" canceled due to the coronavirus crisis are not guaranteed if the travel organization goes bankrupt during the term of the voucher, the Consumentenbond warned on Tuesday. The fund meant to guarantee that customers' holidays will still be paid for only covers canceled bookings made before March 16, De Telegraaf reported.

Because travel agencies did not have sufficient cash to refund all holidays canceled due to the pandemic, travel agencies' umbrella organization ANVR, guarantee fund SGR and the Ministry of Economic Affairs agreed that the agencies could give customers vouchers instead of the refund they are legally entitled to. The SGR would guarantee this voucher, to ensure that the customer's replacement holiday is paid for.

But according to consumers' association Concumentenbond, this only applies to bookings made before March 16. ANVR CEO Frank Oostdam confirmed this to the Telegraaf. "This was not known to all our members, so an unknown number of vouchers for bookings made after mid-March are not guaranteed," he said. 

Figures from the Ministry of Economic Affairs showed that some 400 million euros of 'covered' ANVR vouchers have not yet been claimed, despite holidays being possible in most of Europe since June.