There is great news for former staff and customers of defunct travel agent Thomas Cook - with Hays Travel confirming it is close to reopening all its former rival's Gloucestershire branches.

Signs have gone up in the windows of the old Gloucester branch of Thomas Cook celebrating the arrival of a new team from Hays - albeit with some familiar faces.

Family-run Hays wrote the unexpected happy ending to the devastation caused to more than 2,500 staff and thousands of holiday makers when one of the travel industry's household names announced it was shutting up shop.

As executive struggled to explain how those rewarding themselves with multi-million pound could also have presided over such a debarcle the high street saw 555 shops belonging to the business close.

No one foresaw the arrival of Hays, owned by John and Irene Hays, which rode to the rescue in a game-changing move for its own business - which at the time had a relatively small portfolio of 190 shops and 1,900 staff.

But buy good to its word, it bought the business from the official receiver and the fairytale-like story in now becoming true here in Gloucestershire.

"Yes all the original staff in each branch will have been invited back to work in their original store! There are about three or four people in each branch," said a spokeswoman for Hays.

"All are now open apart from Stroud and Tewkesbury where we are still recruiting."

Gloucester officially opens on November 4, as can be seen from a typically personal and friendly note hung in the Eastgate Shopping Centre shop's window, but that means Cheltenham and Cirencester are already operational.

Hays turnover hit £1blln in 2018.