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danb1974

They abruptly shut down overnight leaving a very large number of people stranded away from home.

Now the government has to pay 150 million to bring them home.

Why not do a gracefull shutdown...???

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European bankruptcy law doesn't allow them to do a graceful shutdown. The company is forced to stop operations.

That's the major difference between American and European bankruptcies.

Could you elaborate? Why not?

`The company is forced to stop operations.`

I mean, what aspect of European law prevents companies from shutting down gracefully?

That's just not true (source: worked for a bankrupt European company once)

Not all European countries, just the vast majority of them.

https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/10/04/555646290/epis...

Wow, harsh. If we had that in the US, half of California would be without electricity and heating fuel for months, given the current state of PG&E.

> They abruptly shut down overnight

Everyone knew this was coming for months.

> Why not do a gracefull shutdown...???

Why would creditors allow their money to be used for that?

In this case a large number of their creditors, indeed the ones that should have highest priority, are the people who are currently stranded because they’ve already paid the company for travel they are now not going to receive.

> In this case a large number of their creditors, indeed the ones that should have highest priority, are the people who are currently stranded because they’ve already paid the company for travel they are now not going to receive.

I'm not sure that's the case - I think individual customers are amongst the lowest priority in a liquidation, as their credit is unsecured. The only people lower are shareholders, I believe. Almost by definition there will be nothing left for customers (as otherwise why would they be liquidising if they can pay all their other creditors?)

“Should” was the operative word in that sentence. The fact that individual consumers would normally be at the back of the line is a disgrace, however true it may be. The sentiment was that in a just world they would be at the head of the line.

> Now the government has to pay 150 million to bring them home.

Part of that will be paid from the Air Travel Trust Fund: https://www.caa.co.uk/ATOL-protection/Air-travel-trust/About...

They would not be able to pay their bills for fuel labor etc. In most countries, if the airline collapses your just SOL.

Such as?

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