2,400 people to lose their jobs as Specialist Leisure Group goes bust

  • Granada

Specialist Leisure Group, the British hotel and leisure travel company, has gone into administration.

Headquartered in Wigan the Group employs over 2,400 people across its 44 UK hotels and travel brands. All will lose their jobs

  • Shearings Holidays

  • National Holidays (trading as Caledonian Travel)

  • UK Breakaways

  • Coast & Country Hotels

  • Bay Hotels, Country Living Hotels

  • Wallace Arnold Travel

The Group, which operates the companies listed above has ceased trading with immediate effect.

Bay Hotels, Coast & Country Hotels and Country Living Hotels will not reopen.

All tours, holidays and hotel breaks booked with the Specialist Leisure Group have been cancelled and will not be rescheduled.

The vast majority of customers are expected to have financial protection from one of the Confederation of Passenger Transport, Bonded Coach Holidays, ATOL or ABTA, or through their credit or debit card issuer.

In a statement, the Group said that administrators will also be making every effort to contact customers, whose travel plans have been cancelled as a result of the Administrations or COVID-19, in writing with more information about making a claim.

Joint Administrator, Sam Woodward, commented:

The jobs of 2,460 employees, 2,207 of which were furloughed at the time of appointment, will now have to be made redundant. Approximately 70 employees will initially be retained to assist the Administrators in disposing of the assets and winding down the business.

  • All customers are advised to visit the Specialist Leisure Group’s website at https://www.specialistleisuregroup.com/ for further information, where they can also find relevant links and instructions on how to claim.