Disruptions cost Air Malta €3.5 million in lost revenue

Air Malta lost over €3.5 million during the seven-day volcanic ash cloud crisis that grounded airplanes across Europe.

The airline itself would only say it lost hundreds of thousands of euros a day when asked to quantify the damage. But Finance Minister Tonio Fenech said the financial impact alone had cost Air Malta about half a million euros a day in lost revenue.

Speaking at the launch of this year's Amitex travel fair, Mr Fenech praised the airline for stepping in to provide extra capacity and flights during the seven-day crisis.

"I am informed that the financial impact alone has cost the airline half a million euros a day in lost revenue."

The airline had to cancel 336 flights from and to Malta over the seven-day span, meaning a drop of 51.8 per cent on regular traffic, equivalent to 32,044 passengers.

Mr Fenech said Air Malta had stepped in and provided extra capacity and flights, helping both the Maltese community and the islands' tourism and manufacturing industries. The airline had diverted and increased staff at customer points and, this notwithstanding, some clients still had to wait some time before being able to change their tickets or offered re-routings.

Ryanair announced yesterday it would comply with EU261 regulations under which European airlines were required to reimburse the reasonable receipted expenses of disrupted passengers.

Ryanair's Michael O'Leary said the crisis showed how "absurd and discriminatory" the regulations were towards Europe's airlines. While the reimbursements of ferry, coach and train operators were limited to the ticket price paid to those operators, airlines were required to meet potentially unlimited expenses as EU governments and regulators wrongly applied a blanket ban on flights over European airspace.

Air Malta said it had honoured all tickets it had issued and also those issued by code-shared partners. It offered its passengers free re-booking on any Air Malta operated scheduled flight or full refund of tickets.

It said it operated two extra flights to Gatwick yesterday and would run another two today.

It started working on aggressive marketing plans in all destinations in the wake of the ash cloud disruption in a bid to return to the demand it was registering over the last months.

The airline said flights were now operating normally.

To minimse inconvenience to its passengers over the last few days, Air Malta operated over 60 relief flights to Rome, Graz, Marseilles, Zurich, Toulouse and London Gatwick.

It also made alternative arrangements for cargo stuck in Frankfurt by trucking it to other airports serviced by Air Malta such as Rome, Marseille, Toulouse and Rome.

Airline associations, including IATA and the Association of European airlines, are holding talks with the various authorities involved with a view to providing guidance to airlines as to how to deal with passenger care-related issues in the prevailing circumstances.