Travel agency cuts staff

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 34031, 20 December 1975, Page 16

Travel agency cuts staff

New Zealand’s tightening economy has started to affect the travel industry, and at least one big travel firm has laid off staff.

Rumours that the Atlantic and Pacific Travel group — one of the big agencies catering for overseas travel —had dismissed staff were confirmed last evening in a statement to “The Press” by the group’s Auckland directors. According to the statement, the merger this year with White Heron Holidays, Ltd, had led to a “rationalisation” of the group’s activities. “In consequence, the company regrets, that some dismissals—of mainly junior clerical staff in Christchurch, Wellington, and Auckland—have become inevitable,” the statement said. “There is no denying that the company, like others in the travel industry, has had a difficult year, due in part to devaluation and increased costs, and remedial action had become unavoidable. “However, the group has the full support of its corporate shareholders —namely Dalgety (N.Z.) Ltd, Shaw, Savill, and Albion, Ltd, Fletcher Holdings, Ltd, and Midland Coachlines, Ltd,” the statement said. (The four corporate share-

holders named control 60 per cent of the shares in Atlantic and Pacific Travel. It is believed that money has been provided by these shareholders to ease tight liquidity in the A. and P. group.) The statement said that the directors were confident that the group would be able to serve the public even more efficiently than in the past now it had been restructured. No figure was available last evening of the number of staff laid off, but it was put at more than 30, being “nine in Christchurch and nine in Wellington, and slightly more in Auckland.” A representative of the directors said that the company was helping laid-off staff to find jobs elsewhere in the travel industry.