Travelocity cuts 320 jobs

Fort Worth, Texas-based Travelocity said it laid off 35 workers Friday and will let go of about 285 customer-service employees as it shuts down its Sacramento, Calif., service center in 60 days. Before the layoffs, Travelocity employed about 1,700 workers.

The cutbacks at the largest Web travel agency come as the airline industry is trying to rebound from the sharp slowdown in airline travel brought on by the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

Airline-backed travel agencies Hotwire.com and Orbitz recently laid off 10 percent of their work forces.

Although staff reductions have become commonplace in the airline industry, Web travel has been left relatively unscathed, with sales levels beginning to return to where they were before the terrorist attacks.

Priceline.com said Thursday that its revenue for the third quarter would come in at the high end of the $280 million to $300 million range analysts had predicted before the Sept. 11 attacks.

For the six months ended June 30, Travelocity's revenue totaled $155.2 million, up from $73.8 million. Net loss before accounting changes totaled $52.4 million, up from $22.6 million.