By Chrysostomos Tsoufis

The third – or fourth according to others – largest tour operator in Europe collapsed but the effects on Greece are manageable, impressively manageable.

Currently in Greece there are about 7,500 visitors who have come to the country through it FTI4,000 of which are in Crete.

Crete, Rhodes and Corfu are the 3 main destinations in which FTI has been active.

All these visitors, as the Ministry of Tourism emphatically emphasizes, will complete their vacation without interruption as if yesterday’s bankruptcy filing by the Bavarian giant had not happened. In fact, the Greek hoteliers will transport these visitors to the airports at their own expense, so that their image of our country is not tarnished in the slightest.

For those foreign tourists who have booked packages to come to our country this year, all market factors that they spoke to skai.gr they estimate that they will eventually just come with another tour operator.

Nature abhors loopholes and it must be considered certain – if it hasn’t already started – that the other big players in the market will rush to buy these packages even if they have to lose the advances.

In the worst case, a leading factor in the field estimated that 5% of the visitors brought by FTI would be lost, that is, approximately 2,250 out of the 450,000 total that came last year.

On the positive side is the fact that no Greek company – hotel or tourist agency – that cooperated with the German company faces a problem that threatens its existence.

As for this year’s packages, because rumors of financial insurmountable difficulties and an upcoming cannon started as early as last September, EVERYTHING is prepaid. Therefore, no businessman will lose money this year.

Last year’s money is another story.

It is estimated that FTI owes €1.8 million to 170 hotels since last year, an average debt of just over €10,000.

The Greek companies will have to claim this money from the law firm Finkenhof which has been appointed as an administrator entering a lengthy legal battle in many such cases.

In the unlikely event that they do not manage to receive even €1, the estimates are that there will still be no problem of survival as we are talking about large hotels whose existence cannot be threatened by a debt of €55,000 which is the largest at the moment .

FTI’s problems began even before the pandemic.

To get back on its feet, it received €590 million from the German government and €280 million through a loan from the Unicredit bank. In mid-April, light appeared at the end of the tunnel with the appearance of the American fund Certares, which announced that it would buy the company whose debts reached approximately €1 billion and inject €125 million in liquidity.

The process of approvals and licensing, however, took much longer than the endurance of the business amid rumors that the Americans were also asking for debt relief in order to proceed, which the German government categorically denied.

The German competition commission was expected to give its approval for the takeover in late August or early September, but FTI did not have the liquidity to last until then and the German government refused to provide guarantees. This is how a company with 11,000 employees and a presence in the tourist market since 1983 came to an inglorious end.

This is the 2nd bankruptcy of a German tour operator in the last 5 years after that of Tomas Cook in September 2019.