London Remains Popular Despite concerns over hoof-and-mouth disease earlier this year, British Airways expects strong vacation bookings through the autumn and winter, according to John Lampl, a spokesman for the airline.

Two Internet travel companies posted revenue gains yesterday, suggesting that there is growing confidence among consumers in online vacation booking.

News, photos and video from the shipwreck have sent shudders through the cruise industry at the most important time of the year for vacation bookings.

"We are very busy with last-minute vacation bookings, which are significantly up over last year's figures," said Ann S. Dixon, the manager of Abbott Travel in Larchmont.

This year could prove even busier; vacation bookings are already ahead of last year's at many resorts, and a heavy October snowstorm in Colorado gave the season an early start.

While airline and hotel companies are often happy to award points for vacation bookings on their own Web sites, they generally stop short of allowing members of their loyalty programs to pay for the vacations with points.

Often tour operators have hotel contracts, allotments and free sell agreements which allow for the immediate confirmation of hotel rooms for vacation bookings.

At one Activity World kiosk that Expedia began managing last spring in the Aston Waikiki Beach Hotel, about 80 percent of the customers had not used Expedia for their vacation booking.

Japanese vacation bookings for China are down by about a third from normal levels.

James V. Cammisa Jr., an independent travel industry analyst, said that his Traveline Survey of 200 travel agents in December showed that 23 percent of warm-weather vacation bookings went to the so-called all-inclusive resorts.