Tui Travel takes a financial wrong turn

Peter Long, chief executive of Tui Travel, says he is disappointed that Paul Bowtell – "one of the most capable chief financial officers I know" – is leaving. But he has accepted Bowtell's resignation any way, which is probably the only credible option after the embarrasment of a £117m write-off relating to discounts offered to UK holidaymakers over the past five years. It seems amazing that the scale of the accounting problem could have gone undetected for so long. Chaotic internal IT systems, compounded by the merger of Thomson and First Choice in 2007 , seems to have the cause. Even so, this is basic territory: surely head office knew the agents in the shops were offering discounts.