When Dan Wood searched for flights for a family holiday to celebrate his wife’s 40th birthday, a special offer from Zoom airline seemed too good to be true.

“Zoom ran a promotion in July called ‘kids go free’. Although we still had to pay fees and taxes on our children’s tickets, the air fares for our two kids were free,” he said. “It was a saving of about £500 so we booked four tickets at a cost of about £2,000. We’re not going until next year but the offer only ran for a limited time so we felt we didn’t have any time to waste.”

Now Mr Wood, 40, a civil engineer from Glasgow, does not know if his family will be able to celebrate his wife’s birthday in Vancouver. Nor does he know if he will get his money back.

“I am really angry,” he said. “A week after we booked, on August 4, Zoom said they were extending their special offer on kids’ seats until the end of August because it had been so popular. At that stage, they must have known they were approaching a potential crisis. It is probably the case that many families took up the free offer and are suffering as a result.”

As soon as Mr Wood heard about the collapse of Zoom, he rang his Visa company. A last-minute decision to pay by credit card means that he should get his money back.