Tallink Grupp starts selling tickets to passengers travelling to Finland
Tallink Grupp reopened ticket sales on Tuesday, 5 May 2020, for passengers wishing to travel to Finland.
In this changed environment Tallink Grupp will also return its other shuttle vessel Star to the Tallinn-Helsinki route for peak weekend departures from Friday, 15 May 2020.
Passenger transport on ferries to Finland was suspended on 11 April 2020 at the request of the Finnish government in order to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus. As the pandemic situation has improved, the Finnish government adopted a decision at yesterday’s cabinet meeting to restore passenger traffic with ferries to Finland for the Schengen area citizens, who need to travel to Finland for work reasons or for other unavoidable reasons.
Border control on the Finnish borders will remain in place also after 14 May until further notice from the Finnish government and the Finnish authorities will work out and publicise information regarding the detailed rules and guidance for border crossing from 14 May onwards in the next few days. Travel four tourism purposes to Finland is currently still not permitted and decisions regarding allowing travel to Finland for tourism will be made by the Finnish government in due course as the pandemic situation improves further. People travelling to Finland must still follow the strict hygiene and health rules and restrictions.
Paavo Nõgene, CEO of Tallink Grupp, commented:
"We welcome the Finnish government’s decision, which will allow many Estonians working in Finland to return to work or to their families from next week. It is clear that as the virus situation improves, we must start moving towards restarting our economies and our work lives, and in today’s world, where our economies are so intertwined with those of our neighbouring countries, it is important to gradually remove restrictions on free movement to restart our economies.“
According to Nõgene the group’s vessels are ready and prepared for the gradual and safe return of services and the company has been working closely with the authorities over the last few weeks already to achieve this.
Nõgene added:
"Many of the safety measures were already in place on our vessels still in operation before the crisis escalated and in the near future we will continue to enhance and introduce even more measures according to our agreements with the authorities and our partners. It is clear that the numbers of passengers will not be the same as they were before the crisis and not all our vessels will return to all the routes straight away. The Finnish government’s decision is a small step forward and here at Tallink we will of course synchronise our steps with those of our governments.“
From now passengers who need to travel to Finland for work or for other unavoidable reasons, can purchase tickets to Finland for Tallink Grupp’s vessels Megastar, Star, Baltic Princess and Galaxy for departures starting from 14 May 2020. Tickets for departures travelling out of Finland can be purchased for all the current departures as previously.