“Majorca may drop off main-stream tourist route”

I read with concern the letters and various news reports in the Bulletin regarding both the cutting of flights to Majorca from Heathrow (Britain's principal airport) and the fact that some sectors such as British tour bosses are coming to the island to meet “to help sell the island as a destination!” I had booked my Christmas flight with BMI to Heathrow back in August to benefit from a good price only to receive an “automated email” (one cannot reply to those!) stating “this flight had been suspended” and that “in due course” I would be advised of alternative arrangements”.

After three weeks I still had no news and come mid September, I thought it was time to take action myself before other alternatives would increase their prices?

After long phone calls to BMI via India and an offer of an unacceptable alternative route to Heathrow on my chosen date via Zurich (an all day job), I declined and after three further weeks still have not received my refund! No wonder we are not enjoying the tourism of before! I have now paid for two flights and will get my refund in due course! I am a persistent person and dread to think how an older or less able customer would have got on.

If we are to be serious about winter tourism on this island, then all sections must “pull “together.
Tourist boards, airlines, hotels, vehicle rental, public transport, (I read that there are no buses to the northeast of the island in the evenings), otherwise people will not come here.

Having just returned from Croatia and Italy, I find that we are an expensive destination and in order to attract any type of tourism we need to have good connections, and it is no use the authorities dreaming up winter tourism if there is no way tourists from all parts of the UK can easily and reasonably access the island! I don't see that other destinations such as Germany have cut their flight so drastically, they seem to fly from quite small airports year round at slightly less frequency and with more compact planes.

Between the British, extra airline taxes and the airlines themselves cutting back, I think that Majorca may drop off the mainstream tourist route which this island so desperately does not need.

One only has to read about Majorca's past poor origins, as described in the early tourist guides, to see how seriously the industry must take getting their collective acts together, and soon.

Yours sincerely
Yvonne Cotton