Thomson's have lost a plane, have you got it?.

NoodleDoodleMan

actually you said it was 'shambolic' which is a lot nearer chaos than variable.
And of course the face of any company is customer service, if that is bad they will look bad, period, however good they may be behind the scenes.
The Thompson rep did a bad job of providing timely and accurate information to the OP, so quite correctly it looked like chaos to them.

Obviously my perception of chaos differs from others.

On the substance of the flight issues - the absolutely foul weather in the UK in the middle of last week was atrocious for airport operations, Thomsons/TUI did well to get a servicable aircraft to Tenerife South, even if it were late.

The logistics of that should not be underestimated.