The Speedferries saga continues

The recent news that Speedferries’ fast ferry service between Dover and Boulogne has been suspended has caused much consternation amongst travellers to France. One of the unique features of the Speedferries offer was opportunity to purchase books of up to 10 open tickets in advance at highly discounted prices, and this proved very popular with frequent travellers, especially ex-pats and those with property in France.

Unfortunately there is not much sign of the service being resumed. BBC Radio 4’s You and Yours programme ran a story on the problems on Wednesday 12 November, and even the intrepid BBC reporters were unable to get any new statement from the company. Hence everything is log-jammed whilst negotiations between Speedferries and the Port of Boulogne continue.

The Speedferries website merely has this update:

Wednesday 12th November
Talks are continuing in Boulogne between SpeedFerries representatives and the Boulogne Chamber of Commerce in order to reach a resolution. Any further updates will be posted here as soon as they become available.

Meanwhile, the Port of Boulogne has issued this statement (10 Nov 2008):-

Due to an important payment delay by SpeedFerries referring to port dues the shipbroker acting for the account of Chamber of Commerce had obtained since some time the agreement of the Commerce Tribunal an ordnance abling him to seize the ship in view to be paid.
The General Management of Speedferries has been advised by the Chamber of Commerce of this act long ago and has taken no measure after many promises.
Consequently the ship broker has taken the decision yesterday night to proceed to the seizing of the ship to guarantee the payments.
Speedone is immobilized in the port of Boulogne up to a agreement with SpeedFerries.
The Chamber of Commerce is opened to all solutions to solve favourably and rapidly this problem in view to resume the service as soon as possible.

The one point for optimism must be that it has to be in the interests of the French to retain this service. It has brought visitors to Boulogne and the surrounding area and coastline, who would otherwise have landed at Calais and would have been whisked by the autoroutes inland without stopping. As much as I do like Calais town (especially the Hotel de Ville), the arrival from the UK is not particularly welcoming and traffic is herded through an industrial landscape and onto the autoroutes – you have to make a real effort to divert into the town of Calais. Whereas the arrival in Boulogne is very central, and the views of the town entice you stop awhile and explore.

For the moment you can still get good prices on the alternative routes to Calais and Dunkerque – Seafrance, P&O and Norfolkline. But no indication that these companies will accept Speedferries tickets.

Norfolkline tends to have some of the cheapest fares, but the crossing to Dunkerque is a little longer, but the boats are all modern and comfortable.

Clearly there are a lot of anxious and angry people – here are some of the comments on this website:-

“I find it amazing that speedferries sold me a block of ten tickets for £250 on October 21st knowing that they had problems, luckily I bought with a credit card so if they go under I should be ok.”(J G Harrison)

“having spoken to a very rude speedferries rep… i was told that my prebooked tickets are not refundable ,,, told to basicially to read the small print.. I have sixteen outstanding so i will issue proceedings against speedferries if they don’t or can’t honour them..” (donluigi)
“Why do people do this? Speedferry was a fantastic service that encouraged lots of people to explore further down the French coast. Think Audressele, Ambleteuse & Wimereux. You had to go through Boulogne which made us, if not others, want to explore more. If the French Government, or the Boulogne Chamber of Commerce, want to favour their own operators, why would we still be loyal? Although Speedferry was Britsh registered, it was Danish in originality and it brough a lot of trade to Boulogne who had been loosing out massively to Calais – think Citi Europe – not everyones cup of tea but a huge money spinner. We would be so sad to see it go – hope people see that is is more than about money, it is about competition! “(Laura)
“Will i be refunded for for the 130 euros i had to find to get back to the UK and what will happen to the rest of my block tickets of which i have 9 left?” (M K Hill)

“Bonne Chance Speedferries. Speedferries was, hopefully will be again, a brilliant service and a brave little company which deserves to succeed. I found their staff polite and cheerful, but I can understand that recently they may have slipped a bit. We all get a bit tense when it looks as if we might be about to join the unemployed. When they started selling blocks of tickets I thought about buying some, but decided against it. I guessed that they were trying to bring in cash. This indicated they might be having cash flow problems. The safety annoucements for Speed One always made me smile, having realised that there wasn’t a Speed 2, 3… The main ferry operators were obviously out to get rid of them. Yesterday, a ferry operators representative ‘put the boot in’ on Radio 4’s You and Yours. If it was in my power to help them, I would.” (Ash)

“Speedferries is a great service that has reduced ALL fares across the channel. I use every year Speedferries to visit Boulogne. My six year old daughter loves swimming and skating at the excellent sports centre at St Martin Boulogne and eating at Flunch. For those of us who can’t afford skiing it made an excellent winter break. Let us hope these problems can be resolved and the customers continue to use the service and show some loyalty to a company that has saved us all money during the last four years.” (Adam Wray)