Virgin Atlantic has been fined $50,000 by the ‘US Department of Transportation‘ for deceptive online price advertising.
The US regulator said the airline displayed air fares without government taxes and fees. That violated US DoT rules requiring any advertising that includes a price for air transportation to state the full price to be paid by the consumer, including all carrier-imposed surcharges.
source: travolution.co.uk
Vueling won the accolade of most innovative low cost model airline at the industry’s ‘Budgie Awards’.
Industry representatives applauded the efforts the company is making to provide their passengers with a wide range of services at competitive prices. In particular, the sector valued the company’s efforts to implement successfully, since July 2010, a pioneering programme of connecting flights through its hub at Barcelona, initially Vueling to Vueling and its network of flights, and since March this year with legacy carriers, including Iberia. Today, Vueling can offer 550 routes through its Vueling Connects network.
source: traveldailynews.com
In a move that has astonished the airline industry, not to mention EasyJet, Haji-Ioannou is preparing to launch a new airline, Fastjet. There are few further details as yet – simply a single, bright red webpage, Fastjet.com, bearing the message “‘by Stelios. Coming soon!’â€.
We don’t yet know what sort of fleet he is planning, whether he has leased any aircraft, which routes Fastjet will fly or whether it will go head to head with EasyJet, in which the billionaire entrepreneur and his family retain a 38 per cent stake.
Haji-Ioannou has been engaged in a long and increasingly bitter battle with EasyJet management on a number of fronts, peace seemed to have broken out between the two sides just last week, when the board bowed to pressure to pay a special dividend to shareholders.
source: irishtimes.com
Aer Lingus has rejected calls by Ryanair, its largest shareholder, for the Irish flag-carrier to pay a special dividend.
Colm Barrington, Aer Lingus chairman, has told Ryanair that the carrier’s board is sticking by its view of May’s annual meeting that a dividend should be considered once a “‘more durable’†economic recovery is apparent.
Aer Lingus and Ryanair have been locked in a fractious relationship since Europe’s largest low-cost airline by revenue launched the first of two failed takeover bids in 2006. Both bids faltered after objections by the Irish government and European competition authorities.
source: FT.com
Aviation entrepreneur Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou announced plans for Fastjet – a start-up rival for established operators such as Ryanair.
Relations between easyJet and Sir Stelios have been decidedly uneasy in the last 18 months.
Although the tycoon and his family still own 38 per cent of easyJet that he began from scratch in 1995 (with a £5million loan from his shipping-magnate father), discussions between the two parties have been icy since Haji-Ioannou resigned from the carrier’s board in May 2010 in a row over strategy.
source: dailymail.co.uk
Irish budget carrier Ryanair would only be interested in buying Boeing’s 737 MAX jetliner if the upgraded narrowbody jet provided “‘material'” fuel savings, Finance Director Howard Millar said.
Boeing has announced plans to upgrade its best-selling passenger jet to match a project by rival Airbus to put new engines on its competing A320.
Ryanair, Boeing’s biggest customer outside the United States, would have preferred Boeing to offer a completely new aircraft rather than an upgrade to the existing model, he said.
source: Reuters
Low-cost carrier Easyjet is to offer passengers in-flight entertainment for the first time.
Personal TVs will be available on selected flights for £7.50.
The new partnership with bespoke travel services provider Mezzo starts this week, with passengers able to hire personal devices loaded with “‘a range of blockbuster movies, TV programmes, music and games’â€.
source: abtn.co.uk
Consumer groups have reacted angrily to moves by budget airline Ryanair to make it more difficult for passengers to avoid credit card fees when buying tickets.
It had been possible to avoid the fee by using any prepaid MasterCard, but the airline has said that from November only customers using its own prepaid MasterCard – called the ‘Ryanair Cash Passport‘ – will avoid the fee.
source: This is Money
An Alaska Airlines plane landed safely on Monday at Oakland International Airport after a bomb threat against the flight was found on a handwritten note in San Francisco, but no bomb was found, the airline said.
Officials notified the airline of a bomb threat found on a piece of paper in San Francisco International Airport specifically referencing Alaska Airlines flight 342, airline spokeswoman Bobbie Egan said.
The airline learned of the bomb threat while the flight, bound from Seattle to Oakland with 126 passengers and six crew on board, was in the air.
source: MSNBC
The ‘Netherlands Board of Tourism & Conventions (NBTC)’ and low-cost carrier easyJet have strengthened their joint cooperation in Europe.
The two companies will work closely over the coming three years to push city breaks to Holland from the German, Spanish, Italian and British markets.
The decision comes just days after easyJet was recognised as Europe’s Leading Low-cost Airline by the prestigious World Travel Awards.
source: breakingtravelnews.com
