Polish tour operator in financial straits

LOT Polish Airlines, which filed the motion against Triada, is still waiting for the tour operator to pay 880,000 zloty (210,000 euro) in arrears, after which the travel company was entered onto the nationwide blacklist of indebted citizens and companies, last Monday.

Triada vanished from the list last Friday, on the tourist agency’s appeal, but its website no longer features the Polish ‘honest company’ certificate, granted by the National Debt Register to reliable entrepreneurs.

Head of Triada, Piotr Zawistowski has said that the company is yet to cover ten invoices, which were to be paid by April, for flights which have not taken place so far. The chairman added that LOT also owed Triada over 200,000 zloty (around 50,000 euro) for transport delays from 2010.

The tour operator, which boasted revenue exceeding 500 million zloty just three years ago, has recently been facing financial straits. Polish credit reference agency Verdict reveals that back in 2009, the company’s losses reached more than 8 million zloty, and in the first two months of 2011 losses exceeded 25.2 million zloty – the last accessible data on the company’s turnover.

Arguing that the data on the middle of the trading year cannot be conclusive, Triada’s chairman expects changes to take place in September, but has refrained from disclosing any further information.

The ongoing financial difficulties have sparked speculation in the tourism industry that the company may soon be facing a takeover. Observers point to the Warsaw Stock Exchange New Connect-listed company Urlopy.pl, which has recently announced it signed a letter of intent on injecting capital into one of Poland’s tour operator giants. Zawistowski refused to comment on the matter. (aba/jb)