“Frustrated and angry” TUI passengers have expressed their anger after accusing the travel company of having left them “abandoned” after yesterday’s worldwide IT outage.
Flights around the globe were cancelled yesterday after a Microsoft Crowdstrike bug caused computer systems to go down.
And while a fix for the issue was rolled out yesterday afternoon, some TUI customers have criticised the holiday firm for how they have dealt with the situation.
Those attempting to fly back to Bristol from Rhodes in Greece have shared stories of a holiday ending from hell after being forced to sleep on the airpot floor.
Andrew Rankine said: “We’re stressed. We’ve been here since 8pm last night and there are young kids, elderly people, people sleeping on the floor.”
He added that passengers were left in the dark as to what was happening with their flight, telling local news outlet Bristol Live: “TUI have still not given us any information. The reps that are on the ground here have no idea what’s going on. We’ve tried to phone the helpline, but that just rings out.
“They told us at about 2.30am that we’d have to find our own accommodation because they weren’t going to put us up. We’ve got loads of people here – some people are on medication. It’s just not good at all.
“We’ve been sleeping by the departure area. We’ve taken up the length of the building, there’s that many of us.
“Some are on the floor, the kids are on the chairs. We slept wherever we could last night and this morning.”
While a fix to the bug was deployed yesterday afternoon, CrowdStrike’s chief executive has warned it will take “some time” for systems to be fully restored.
Rankine said that TUI had provided passengers with a food voucher so they could buy dinner at the airport following the inconvenience.
However, he claimed that the voucher was only valid in one shop and that the outlet had run out of food within half an hour.
Jo Smart, who found herself in the same situation, said: “It’s really annoying because we’ve all got work and animals that we have to get back to.
“It’s frustrating not knowing anything. There’s people on the floor, kids with no blankets or pillows.
“We just feel abandoned, just left here with no accommodation – it’s just shocking.”
A TUI spokesperson said: “Due to the global IT issue at airports and airlines around the world yesterday, TUI’s overall service level was heavily impacted and we would like to apologise to everyone affected.
“Whilst the original IT issue was outside of our control, an essential system needed to run our airline operation remained unstable late into last night.
“We therefore made the difficult decision to cancel a number of outbound flights.
“We are very sorry to all those customers impacted as we understand how disappointing this would have been and recognise that many customers were already at the airport waiting for their departure.
“We would like to reassure customers due to return home from their holiday that inbound flights will take place and we will update them directly when we have more information.
“We also ask that all TUI customers due to travel this weekend regularly check the TUI website for updates. We will also contact customers directly via text message and email if there are any changes to their flights.
“We are deeply sorry for the inconvenience this has caused to our customers, and our teams are working extremely hard to get everyone home from their holiday as soon as possible.”