Dutch travel website TravelBird, which sells bargain holidays online, has stopped operating and applied for court protection from its creditors.

Holidaymakers who have booked breaks through the website are covered by the SGR guarantee and will be contacted by the organisation, the company, based in Amsterdam, said in a press release.

The company said ‘seasonal fluctuations’ had led to delays in paying some partners and that the company had failed to find extra financing.

There have been several reports of problems with payments and last week, the Fletcher Hotel group told website Travelpro that it would not accept any more TravelBird clients because bills had not been paid.

The company has a workforce of 310 and some seven million people have had a TravelBird break over the past eight years. The company claims to have turned in its first profit in the first half of 2018.