The UK’s biggest tour operator, Tui, is to shut 166 stores in the UK and Ireland and shift hundreds of affected staff to a home working operation, as the coronavirus pandemic hastens the move away from booking holidays on the high street to online.

Tui said the store closures would affect 900 staff but that its strategy would save the vast majority from losing their jobs.

The company, which specialises in package holidays, said about 630 of the workers affected would move into a remote sales and service team.

“We have world-class advisers at Tui, so we hope many of them will become homeworkers and continue to offer the personalised service we know our customers value,” said Andrew Flintham, managing director of Tui UK & Ireland.

He said UK staff will avoid job cuts, with the remaining 270 roles to be cut through the closure of overseas customer service centres outsourced to third party providers.

Tui, which will continue to run 350 retail stores, said those to be closed have been determined using a range of factors including local market data, consumer trends and predictions on the future of the travel sector. Some affected staff will move to vacancies at its remaining high street stores.

“We want to be in the best position to provide excellent customer service, whether it’s in a high street store, over the telephone or online, and will continue to put the customer at the heart of what we do,” said Flintham.

“It is therefore imperative that we make these difficult cost decisions, look after our colleagues during such unprecedented uncertainty and also offer a modern customer service.”

The company said the shift away from the high street followed a “review of UK customer booking behaviours”. Flintham said the pandemic had hastened the inexorable shift of consumers from booking holidays in store to online.

“Customer behaviours have already changed in recent years, with 70% of all Tui UK bookings taking place online,” he said. “We believe Covid-19 has only accelerated this change in purchasing habits, with people looking to buy online or wishing to speak with travel experts from the comfort of their own home.”

Tui said in May that it planned to cut up to 8,000 jobs across Europe to reduce costs by 30%, in response to the tourism industry grinding to a halt due to the pandemic.