A group of friends have had their dream holiday plans left in tatters after the UK's third biggest holiday company went bust.

Kevin Bibey, 23, from Ditton, had a dream holiday planned in Orlando this November with his brother and a friend.

Now they are now among 200,000 people whose holidays have been cancelled because of the demise of the XL Leisure Group because of rising fuel costs and the credit crunch.

He only found out five minutes before starting work this morning.

He said: "I was disappointed and a bit confused about what had happened.

"I looked into it a bit more and realised it was a really big deal."

It would have been the field sales executive from the Kent Messenger's Larkfield office first trip to Florida since working at Disney for 14 months.

He said: "I was really looking forward to it, I've still got lots of mates out there.

"We'd been saving for a while, and it would have been my friend's first time in the States."

It wasn't the first indication his long awaited trip in the sun might be in jeopardy.

Mr Bibey had already had a letter from Travel City Direct, which operates under parent company XL, saying his flight date had been changed because of fuel costs and the economic slump.

Fortunately because they are ATOL protected the three will all get their £1,100 back, but the delay in getting the refund could mean cancelling this year's plans.

Mr Bibey said: "Because of the demand for refunds we're told it could take up to three months to get our money back.

"So if we do go this year it'll mean us borrowing the money from our parents and paying them back which seems a bit unfair on them.

"The other problem is that other travel companies are catching on and putting their prices up."

Tanya Douglass from Sittingbourne stands to lose £1,000 on a villa after losing her XL flights to Turkey.

She'd been planning to surprise her mum and spend some time with her because she's going into hospital for three months from October.

She said: "With a company of their size I can't believe it was only midnight last night they realised they were in financial trouble

"They must have known about this months ago, you know when things are going wrong so to still be taking bookings last night is disgusting, and I just feel so sorry for those people who've turned up at the airport this morning."

Ms Douglass was due to fly out on September 22 to a rented villa which has been paid for in full.

Now she's praying she can get similarly priced flights on the same days otherwise she could lose her money.