A WESTHOUGHTON family say they were left kicking their heels in airports for TWELVE hours when their two-week break to Spain went wrong.

And mother of two Jane Harrison, aged 32, of Kennet Close, is calling for drastic improvements from tour operator Airtours to make holidays worthwhile.

She says she was left stranded for eight hours at Manchester Airport with her husband William, aged 33, daughter Laura, eight, and son Thomas, only 19 months, waiting for a flight to Menorca.

And although food was provided during the delay, Jane, who runs a cleaning business, says she feels the level of service from Airtours had been a let down.

Jane claims to have phoned Airtours 30 times the day after she returned from holiday without being able to get through.

So she sent an official complaint to Airtours by fax and said: "We were not kept in touch with the situation at Manchester Airport and had to keep asking at the information desk.

"We learned to treat the words 'technical problems' as absolute rubbish.

"People with babies were running out of nappies and they were not properly attended to.

"And a playroom which the children could have used was closed for refurbishment.

"One family was not even told about the delay and only found out from us. The same family pre-booked seats at £5 per head to ensure that they would be sitting together on the flight. But they weren't.

"We pre-booked our seats but were directed elsewhere when we got on the plane."

By the time the family arrived in Spain they say they had already lost a day's holiday.

On the return journey the family were delayed four hours and say they only received basic snacks while they waited at the airport.

Jane added: "Again we were left without information about the flight.

"One of the people on our flight phoned Airtours from Spain and was told that the Managing Director does not speak to holidaymakers."

An Airtours spokesman replied: "We apologise to those passengers who were inconvenienced by these delays.

"Unfortunately from time to time aircraft are delayed for any number of reasons such as bad weather, reactionary delays from previous flights, problems with take off or landing slots, baggage issues or technical reasons.

"At all times safety is of paramount concern."

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.