Ebookers is the Internet arm of Flightbookers

Chairman Dinesh Dhamija said there had been a "huge move to online bookings", and announced a cost-cutting programme.

The details came as the firm unveiled its first full-year profit: during 2003, Ebookers earned £1.3m before tax.

Including exceptionals and goodwill, the group made a pretax loss of £14.9m compared with a £12.3m loss in 2002.

During 2003 sales almost doubled to £521m from £274m.

Cost cutting

"Despite the Iraq war, the Sars epidemic and a very hot European summer persuading would be long-haul travelers to stay at home, we have recorded our first annual adjusted pretax profit," said Mr Dhamija.

The results upturn comes after many of the firm's customer service functions were "offshored" to India.

Internet bookings for the first quarter of 2004 are up 40% in the UK, and 107% in the rest of Europe.

"As over 80% of our turnover is to mid and long-haul destinations we have seen little effect, if any, from the Madrid bombings," said Mr Dhamija.

Savings plans include standardising websites and systems technologies throughout the group, and disposing of nine retail outlets following successful online conversion across Europe and the UK.

Ebookers was previously the internet arm of Flightbookers, the travel agency founded by Mr Dhamija and his wife back in 1983.