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LONDON – Following the UK Government’s announcement to place Portugal in the green list, travel companies have experienced a 663% rise in bookings as a result.
According to Skyscanner, the country took the vast majority of bookings placed between May 7-9, with the top 10 searched destinations being:
- Faro
- Lisbon
- Porto
- Alicante
- Madeira
- Malaga
- Tel Aviv
- London
- Tenerife
- Gibraltar
With Portugal being in four of those 10 most-searched destinations, this of course produces a level of good news for the country and also for airlines and travel companies alike.
Commenting on the news was Gavin Harris, the Pricing and Deals Expert for Skyscanner who emphasised that people want European beach holidays.
“We saw a busy weekend of searches and bookings, as engaged travellers reacted to the news of the green list. Our data clearly shows that people want European beach holidays, as Portugal was by far the top searched and booked destination on Skyscanner.”
“The green list announcement also drove searches for amber countries like Spain for later in the year. The average fare for bookings made over the weekend remained lower than usual, with return tickets to Porto costing on average £101, Lisbon sitting at £114 and Faro at £127.”
“Plenty of travel providers are keeping prices low to compete for bookings and there are still extremely attractive deals to be had for spring and summer trips.”
It is also understood that most of the bookings made over the weekend are for trips both this month and for June, with it being 26% and 25% respectively.
In-all, this remains to be an item of good news, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic decimating European and UK travel over the last year.
All eyes now will be from the airlines and travel companies towards the UK Government, who are set to announce an update to the traffic light system in the next three weeks, with hopes that more countries will be added to the green.
