With almost 22 million people set to visit countries across the region, the “eurozone” is expected to remain the most popular destination for UK travellers this year. The calculation comes from First Rate Exchange Services and a previous announcement that 58% of UK adults plan to take at least one overseas holiday this year.

Holiday costs have fallen across all “eurozone” countries over the last year, with prices in Spain seeing cuts by as much as 30%, the latest Post Office holiday money report shows.

First Rate managing director Gordon Gourlay said: “Lower tourist prices across the “eurozone” are extremely good news for the millions of UK holidaymakers who are set to make to a return to traditional holiday destinations such as Spain and Portugal this year.

“UK foreign currency retailers can expect strong demand for the currency as savvy travellers stock up on euros in order to get best value from foreign exchange deals in the UK.”

The majority of UK travellers intend to make the most of their holiday money by picking up foreign currency before they travel. Two in five (40%) travellers also said they would have to withdraw cash at ATMs whilst overseas even though this runs the risk of hefty commission and cash withdrawal fees; while travellers’ cheques are still popular with over 15% of travellers including them in their holiday wallet.

More than half of German companies are confident in seeing an upturn in business travel before the end of the year it has been reported in the results of a poll of members of the Association of German Travel management (VDR) for trade show ITB. The poll found that a quarter of those questioned expect to see a recovery in business travel activity at the start of next year. Only ten per cent of companies said they were concerned that there would not be a recovery in business travel.

Almost 60% of VDR member companies are still paying particular attention to costs and are looking at cheaper travel options. Only 11% of these companies are cutting out all travel which is not deemed absolutely necessary, compared with twice as many in October 2009.

In order to cut down on travel, companies are making more use of web, video and telephone conferencing. One third of the VDR member companies that were questioned now use this technology instead of business travel. A further 20% are following this trend in order to improve internal communication.

Dr Martin Buck, director of the competence centre travel & logistics and show organiser Messe Berlin, said: “The trend that has been revealed by the latest snap poll by the VDR is giving the industry reasons for cautious optimism. This is good news for ITB Berlin.”

Trade Travel Show, ITB Berlin 2010 takes place from 10th- 14th March.

Barcelona photo by Flickr User Jsome1

Year-round flights between London City Airport and Barcelona are being re-introduced by British Airways. The service was previously run only in summer but will now resume at the end of the month and will continue all year.

An extra Saturday morning service will be introduced in May, bringing the total number of flights to seven a week.

The expanded Barcelona capacity comes in addition to the start of flights to Majorca and Ibiza in May and an existing service to Madrid.

Luke Hayhoe, commercial manager for BA CityFlyer, the wholly owned BA subsidiary which will operate the services, said: “The Spanish destinations are proving extremely popular from London City Airport. Barcelona has traditionally operated as a summer only destination but there is a big demand from both business and leisure passengers for us to continue through the winter.”

Easyjet Ryanair advert source http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/mar/03/easyjet-ryanair-asa#zoomed-picture

The Advertising Standards Authority has upheld a complaint by Ryanair against its rival EasyJet after they made a claim in an advertising campaign that claimed that the Irish competitor did not fly passengers “to the place you actually booked”.

The poster, which appeared on a train, suggested Ryanair flew to airports in the proximity of the cities promoted as destinations; but Ryanair successfully argued that the ad was misleading as it implied people would not fly to the city they booked to whereas the advertising and website made clear where the airline flew to.

Upholding Ryanair’s complaint, the ASA said: “While we noted EasyJet’s argument that the ad was merely a comparison between airport locations, we were concerned that by listing the airports which Ryanair flew to but only referring to the ones EasyJet flew to in much smaller print at the bottom of the ad and by not giving any data which readers might use to make an assessment of the facts, the ad did not achieve that end.

“We considered the challenging tone of the headline ‘Who loves flying you to the place you actually booked?’ combined with the implication that Ryanair misled customers and flew them to airports different to the ones they had booked was denigratory.”

EasyJet UK general manager Paul Simmons said: “It is a well-know fact that EasyJet flies to major airports whereas Ryanair serves out-of-town airfields which can be a two hour bus ride away from your destination.

“While we are disappointed by the ruling which is based on a technicality, we respect the ASA’s decision and will not repeat the advert in the same form.”

It’s rather ironic that Ryanair had to turn to the ASA to use the very same codes of conduct that in previous years they have had disputes over.

Google, together with Russian Railways have launched a virtual train journey along the famous Trans Siberian Railway which goes across two continents, 12 regions and 87 cities. You navigate the journey by clicking on the area you’d like to view and are taken along as if you are sitting on the train and gazing out of the window. The film quality is brilliant and you can accompany your journey with the realistic sound of the rumbling of wheels, or by listening to some Russian radio or Nikolai Gogol’s “Dead Souls”, or even Leo Tolstoy’s “War and Peace”. You can also click on icons on the map which will give you interesting information about areas on the journey.

I imagine that this step for Google and Russian Railways will push forward the virtual world that many use  already online, it will enable people looking at different places to go on holiday to get a realistic taster of the feeling of being there rather than staged shots in travel guides where a lot of the pictures can be quite similar.

Some state that this could be an alternative for cash-strapped people who want to look at areas of the world they may never get to travel to, however I think that it may give those with the natural curiosity to travel even more itchy feet; it certainly did me! For whatever reason you’d like to see the Trans Siberian Railway though, this new view is worth a look. Check it out here.

Ryanair has lost almost 60% of its visibility online since September, according to analysis of key search terms used when consumers use the Internet to find a flight. Ryanair held fourth position in the third quarter of 2009 but by the last three months of the year EasyJetcame in at fourth place whereas Ryanair dropped to thirty-two.

Flight price comparison company Cheapflights also saw a 25% drop in search visibility dropping from position two to eight.

The independent research was carried out by search marketing agency Greenlight who determined the best positioned and most visible websites in the online flights sector based on the volumes for each keyword.

The company identified the 3,200 of the most commonly used search terms by UK web users. They cumulatively delivered 28.1 million searches for flight-related terms in December. The term ‘Flight’ accounted for 59% of all flight-related searches.

Short-haul destinations, mainly within Europe, accounted for almost 5.3 million searches in December. Long haul flight search volumes fell 43% since September although when compared to domestic and short haul, they decreased the least.

New York, Bangkok and Australia were the most popular destinations.

In natural searches and with 89% share of voice in December, SkyScanner ranked first place on page one of Google for 445 of the 3,200 keywords analysed, including the most searched for term – ‘Flight’. Travelsupermarket followed with 72% visibility and Expedia followed with 57%.

Ryanair photo by Flickr User aromano

Ryanairhave plans to expand even further with more new routes fom Stansted and East Midlands. The budget carrier is to serve Fez in Morocco, Figari in Corsica and Fuerteventura in the Canary Islandsfrom Stansted this summer.

Flights for Figari and Fez start on 4th May and to Fuerteventura on 5th May with fares starting at £31.99 one way inclusive of taxes and charges.

East Midlands will gain services to Fuerteventura from 2nd May and Venice Treviso from 5th May with fares leading in at £29.99 one way inclusive of taxes and charges. These rates apply to bookings made until midnight on 11th February.

The airlines expansion also includes flights from Cork starting in June to Alicante, Barcelona (Reus), Bordeaux, Faro, La Rochelle, Lanzarote and Malaga.

Luton will gain flights to Bratislava from April and Knock will have a Barcelona service.

“Ryanair will continue to grow as other airlines pull routes and reduce capacity,” a spokesman said. “With passengers becoming increasingly price sensitive, Ryanair will continue to expand.”

Easyjet aircraft picture by Flickr User Pex Cornel

EasyJet has warned that economic conditions “remain challenging” and the budget carrier continues to expect a tough trading environment. The forecast came as the airline reported total revenue up by 10.5% to £607.5 million in the three months to 31st December.

EasyJet’s first half performance and consequently the 2010 first half pre-tax result is expected to be a loss in the range of £80 million to £95 million, described as a “significant improvement” compared to the first half of the prior financial year.

“Economic conditions remain challenging and we continue to expect a tough trading environment, however, the underlying performance of the business in the first quarter has been encouraging and EasyJet remains on track to deliver substantial profit improvement during 2010.” the airline said.

Chief executive Andy Harrison said: “EasyJet was the best performing European airline during 2009 because we offer the lowest fares to the most convenient airports. EasyJet has continued to deliver a superior performance into the first quarter of our new financial year. The strength of customer demand has allowed us to grow passengers flown by nearly 10% with virtually no yield deterioration, slightly ahead of our initial expectations.

Holidaymakers to Turkey face paying more for tourist items, despite normally being seen as a value destination outside the eurozone. While the Turkish lira has weakened by more than seven per cent against sterling in the past year, a new Post Office Worldwide Holiday Costs Barometer reveals a price lift of almost 44% for meals, drinks and other holiday items. Spain emerges as the cheapest eurozone destination – placed fourth overall in the Barometer and showing a price fall of 30% for the same items surveyed a year ago.

Overall, tourist costs are down in 17 of the 25 destinations previously surveyed, with some of the biggest falls in Bulgaria, Mexico, Mauritius and Barbados.

Jamaica, Egypt and Dubai top the list of destinations where holidaymakers are financially best off thanks to a strengthening of the pound over the past year. Tourists will receive over 21% more Jamaican dollars, almost 14% more Egyptian pounds and 12.6% more UAE dirhams compared to January 2009, according to the annual Post Office Travel Services Holiday Money Report.

Post Office head of travel money Sarah Munro said: “Judging by the price rises recorded in our latest cost comparison survey, Turkey is unlikely to be the cheap destination that it was just a couple of years ago when the Post Office barometer identified the country as a best buy.

“For 2010 our shopping basket of eight tourist staples indicates that Turkey is now 68% more expensive than Spain.

“The eurozone looks to be striking back after the battering its resorts took in 2009 when Post Office euro sales were down over 14%.

“This meant that although the euro remained our bestselling currency by far, accounting for a dominant 72.2% of our travel money business, its share reduced by over two per cent compared with 2008.

“However, the Post Office Worldwide Holidays Costs Barometer research has revealed an underlying reduction in eurozone prices and, when you add the improved exchange rate to this, the outlook looks relatively sunny for UK holidaymakers.”

Flybe Aircraft picture by Flickr User bob the courier

Flights to Hannover from Exeter are to run next summer via Newcastle. Flybe is to operate the route three times a week between 31st March and 29th October.

Tickets from Exeter start at £59.99 including taxes and charges. Flights will depart from Exeter at 07.20, arriving in Hannover at 12.00, then departing Hannover at 12.25, arriving in Exeter at 15.05.

The airline’s chief commercial officer Mike Rutter said: “This announcement further reinforces Flybe’s commitment to bringing convenient, low cost travel to the South West and reaffirms our position as Exeter’s number one airline.”

Exeter Airport managing director Jamie Christon said: “Links to Germany have been on our wish list for many years and this route to Hannover looks set to please many travellers from the South West. There has been a gap in the market.”