As a finance director in the travel industry there are many areas which you must understand in order to keep the business running successfully. Do you have a good understanding of the key issues for you and your finance team in 2020?  

• Accounting and reporting – with accounting standards constantly changing or being updated, it’s vital to keep on top of these, as not doing so could be costly to your business. The new IFRS 16 on leases, the FRS 102 Triennial Review and new carbon reporting requirements are all applicable to travel companies.
• Travel VAT and TOMS – now that the UK has left the EU and we are in a transition period, many questions have been raised as to what this means for TOMS. Whilst we don’t yet know what is going to happen to TOMS, whatever the changes, it’s likely to have a big impact on travel businesses. 
• Changes to off-payroll working (IR35) rules – From April 2020 you must comply with this new legislation. These new rules will shift the responsibility of assessing tax and national insurance obligations from the off-payroll workers, such as contractors, homeworkers and consultants, to the end user client and require the organisation paying the contractor’s limited company to deduct income tax and NICs. 
• Managing risk with trade partners – The last year has seen a number of high profile failures, with Short Breaks Limited; Superbreak Mini-holidays Limited and the Thomas Cook Group, bringing to the fore issues for consumers, retailers and tour operators alike – as well as many successes with fulfilment, repatriation and refund operations. It’s vital that tour operators understand how to protect themselves against supplier failures and ensure they have robust payments terms in their agency agreements.    

Hear in-depth insight on these topics, and many more including managing foreign exchange risk, the future of payments, mergers and acquisitions, technology for travel businesses at ABTA’s fourth annual Travel Finance Conference. Join over 100 of your industry colleagues and use this two-day event towards your CPD.   

“As head of travel and leisure for the mid-market in KPMG, I am really looking forward to hosting ABTA’s second annual travel finance conference. ABTA is able to attract over 180 finance leaders from across travel and leisure to discuss the current trends in travel covering finance, taxation, M&A and pressing issues. It is fantastic to have the ability to share our experience and learn from others in such a vibrant and constantly changing sector.” Richard Aston, Associate Partner, Head of Mid-Market Travel and Leisure, KPMG. 

For more information and to register, please visit abta.com/abtaevents.