Swiss cancelling more flights
The buzzy news of this week is Swiss cancelling more flights.
Due to bottlenecks in air traffic control, ground staff and airport service providers, Swiss has to cancel flights again. However, the proportion of cancelled flights is in the low single-digit percentage range.
Swiss has to cancel flights again or leave them to other airlines. According to company spokeswoman Karin Montani, these are bottlenecks in air traffic control in Europe, bottlenecks in-ground and airport service providers worldwide, and in Swiss. However, she says the proportion of cancelled flights in the entire summer flight schedule is still in the low single-digit percentage range.
Cancellation and outsourcing of European and long-haul flights
According to Montani, Nuremberg’s destination will be removed entirely from the program from July to October. There are also frequency reductions on individual short routes such as Gdansk, Dresden or Warsaw. From Geneva, Swiss is also offering five fewer flights a week to London than initially planned.
But not only short-haul flights are affected: the airline also flies once a week from Zurich to San Francisco less. As a further measure against the lack of employees on the ground and in the air, Swiss is also outsourcing the flights to Vienna between July 4th and September 4th to the sister company Austrian Airlines. As Montani explained, this is now carrying out the Swiss flights to the Austrian capital.
About two per cent of passengers are affected
“The additional adjustments have become necessary due to ongoing resource bottlenecks in the airline industry,” says Montani. According to the spokeswoman, the planned flight cancellations will affect around 2 per cent of all passengers who booked a flight with Swiss in July and August. That’s about 10,000 passengers.
The “Blick”, reported first, calculates that a total of around 30,000 passengers will be affected by the changes. “As mentioned, the rest are passengers whose flights are taken over by our sister company,” said the spokeswoman. Individual solutions would be provided for those in need.
In April, Swiss had to cancel numerous flights for the same reasons. Unfortunately, the airline did not announce exactly how many at the time, nor does it now. But it should have been a three-digit number.
Half of those affected are Vienna passengers
More than half of those affected are passengers to Vienna whose flights are now being taken over by Austrian Airlines. “Individual solutions are being sought for all other affected passengers, such as rebooking on flights within the Lufthansa Group or flights from other Star Alliance carriers,” said the spokeswoman.
Anyone affected by a flight cancellation will be notified by email. According to Montani, this email also contains travel alternatives that passengers can accept or reject. “Another option is to apply for a refund of the ticket price.”
“We have introduced various measures to defuse the current tense situation and guarantee our customers the best possible flight plan stability,” says Oliver Buchhofer, who is responsible for flight operations at Swiss. According to Buchhofer, this includes colleagues from the Lufthansa Group coming to Swiss’s aid by helping out in the cabin.
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