TripAdvisor to lay off 900 employees due to COVID-19 impact

April 29, 2020
San Francisco: TripAdvisor has announced that it will trim its workforce by about 900 employees, which is approximately one-quarter of the total number of people the online travel company employs, due to the effects of COVID-19.

Majority of these 900 roles that the company is eliminating – about 600 – are based in the US and Canada, said TripAdvisor which is headquartered in Needham, Massachusetts.

In addition, TripAdvisor will also be asking for the majority of its salaried employees to move to a 4-day work week and take a corresponding 20 per cent reduction in base salary, for three months starting in June, the company’s CEO and Co-founder, Steve Kaufer, said in a message to employees on Tuesday.

“Since mid-to-late February, COVID’s impact on the travel industry and our business has slowly revealed itself day by day. The pandemic has had an impact on the economy that no one expected. Our personal and professional lives have changed in profound ways,” Kaufer said.

The measures announced on Tuesday are part of Phase 3 plans the company is executing to navigate near-term challenges and position its business for recovery.

Kaufer later made the message to employees public in a blog.

“I am making this announcement public because there will be hundreds of amazing people looking for work in the U.S. and abroad (for what we hope will be a brief period of time),” Kaufer said.

“Our wish is you will consider them for open roles at your company,” he added.

The TripAdvisor CEO said that the tough measures became necessary so that the company can “focus on its mission to serve travelers for years and decades to come.”

“For those employees leaving Tripadvisor, we are offering transition packages, including severance pay and outplacement support. In the US and Canada, we will also provide health insurance continuation for a period of time,” Kaufer said.

As part of its cost cutting measures, TripAdvisor also plans to reduce its global real estate footprint which currently includes 52 offices.

“In the United States, we will also be closing both the San Francisco and downtown Boston office building locations permanently, allowing remaining employees in those offices to continue working virtually (or, in the case of Boston, work out of our Needham Headquarters),” Kaufer said.IANS