Executives at two of Europe’s largest budget airlines have revealed their belief that they will benefit from the current financial crisis. Executives at easyJet and Ryanair believe that more travellers will use their airlines in a bid to reduce the cost of their holidays. easyJet Chief Executive, Andy Harrison, commented, ‘We’re clearly winning market share from our competitors. In a world where all you can see in the papers is about the credit crunch and cutbacks, you can see that easyJet is doing incredibly well. easyJet, who have announced a winter sale on all flights between December 31st and March 28th, recently reported a 22 per cent increase in passengers numbers between September 2007 and 2008.
Meanwhile, British Airways and Virgin have this week announced reductions in their fuel surcharges on economy and premium economy flights. The cut will see fuel surcharges drop by as much as £26 on a return flight, following criticism from the Air Transport Users Council (AUC), who last month criticised BA and Virgin’s reluctance to follow the lead of several airlines in slashing their fuel surcharges.
