British Airways is extending choice for short-haul customers at Gatwick with the launch of a new “hand-luggage only” fare.

The new type of fare from Gatwick will be available initially to five destinations – Amsterdam, Dubrovnik, Jersey, Tunis and Turin, starting from £39 one-way. The fare will go on sale from February 19, for travel from February 26, 2013.

The initiative occurs alongside the transfer from Heathrow of five Airbus A319s for the Gatwick short-haul fleet.

Peter Simpson, director of Gatwick for British Airways, said: “The introduction of our hand baggage only fare is all about giving our customers more freedom to choose the kind of flying they want.

As airports discuss price charges ABTA's research reveals what passengers really want from their airport experiences.

The research shows that the top two improvements consumers would most like to see at airports are speeding up check-in and speeding up security.

More than half (52 per cent) of consumers said speeding up check-in would significantly improve their journey through the airport while 48 per cent said speeding up security would do the same. 

Cutting queues is seen as more important than a range of other services such as the quality of food, retail offering or access to wi-fi facilities.

In fact, a third (34 per cent) said improvements to the quality and variety of retail outlets would make no difference to their experience and four in ten (40 per cent) passengers said the same about access to wi-fi facilities.

The first TATOC cold callers list of this year has been issued by the Association.

The list comprises all the companies who were reported to the TATOC helpline by consumers in January 2013 for cold calling. The list is verified before it is released.

Also available to download is the report from the helpline showing how much money consumers lost to cold callers during the month. In January a staggering £96,165 was reported as having been taken by consumers. A breakdown of the amount can be found in the report but the activities of cold calling re-sale companies accounts for the majority.

You can read the full list and download the report from the TATOC website.

Timeshare and fractional industry professionals from across the world gathered for the announcement of the Perspective Magazine Award winners last week during a gala dinner at the Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills, California.

The awards banquet was held at the conclusion of the GNEX 2013 annual conference, which saw a record 182 attendees, including TATOC's Harry Taylor, representing 104 companies. Perspective Magazine is a TATOC platinum affiliate.

Winners were decided through a combination of online voting and decisions from a panel of four industry experts, with each of the five components accounting for 20 percent of the overall results.