SUNWAY TRAVEL COMPANY FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY

Sunway travel agency, located in Yekaterinburg, filed a claim for its own insolvency. The company's debt to counterparties amounts to 41.6 million rubles. It is known that the company has been acting as an intermediary since 2018, linking travel agencies with tour operators. The company worked under the brands Cleo Tour, Tour-box, as well as Vista group of companies.

Sunway gained notoriety in the summer of last year after it announced a complete termination of activities on August 28. Then the representatives of the company said that the company's property and accounts receivable were quite enough to meet the requirements of the agencies that used the electronic booking system.

It was proposed to conduct the procedure of cancellation of those tours that have already been booked by this time, entering into direct interaction with tour operators.

As a result, the clients' personal accounts on the company's website were blocked. According to a number of experts, more than 400 travel agencies throughout Russia became the victims of Sunway. By October, it became clear that the number of agencies deceived by the services of the company was enormous (more than 140 firms in Yekaterinburg alone). And while a government moratorium postponed the company's bankruptcy, it became clear that the it would be held accountable.

Since the booking center continued to attract funds until the last moment, many counterparties considered the company's actions to be fraudulent. They filed a complaint with the police, but the results of the work of law enforcement agencies on this issue remained unknown.

ATOR experts estimated the possible damage from the Sunway company at 100-200 million rubles.

It is interesting that the founder of Sunway was Maxim Puzankov is the President of the Ural Tourism Association. He headed the Vista and Cleo Tour groups. Currently, according to data from open sources, the sole owner of the company is Irina Kosterova, who also owns Vista 74.