Alitalia will terminate operations between Rome and Skopje due to weaker than expected demand. The decision comes two and a half years after the airline introduced flights on the route. The Italian carrier will operate its final service between the two capital cities on November 30. Ticket sales have been suspended thereafter. Alitalia currently maintains seven weekly flights to Skopje with its 88-seat Embraer E175 jet, which will reduce to three per week from November 15, prior to their termination at the end of the month. The airline will keep the city as part of its network through its codeshare partnership with Air Serbia. It has its flight numbers and designator code on the Serbian carrier's service between Belgrade and Skopje.
Alitalia's operations to the Macedonian capital will be discontinued together with its service between Rome and Istanbul. The sudden move comes after reports surfaced the airline is losing 500.000 euros on a daily basis. Etihad Airways, which has a 49% stake in the carrier, said last month that Matteo Renzi’s government has not delivered on its promises and that "a number of the condition precedents haven’t been met". Within the former Yugoslavia, Alitalia serves Belgrade and Podgorica. Despite announcements in 2013 that it would introduce services to Zagreb and Pristina, these plans never materialised. In the past, Alitalia also maintained flights between Milan and Skopje, but the route was suspended in 2008 due to low profitability. Furthermore, it once flew to both Sarajevo and Zagreb and operated seasonal summer flights to Dubrovnik and Split as well.
The Italian carrier faces no direct competition on its Rome - Skopje service. It becomes the third carrier to terminate operations to the Macedonian capital this winter season, following Swiss International Air Lines and Czech Airlines, which discontinued services over a week ago. The latest suspension will give Wizz Air, which dominates at Skopje Airport, an opportunity to consider the route to Rome. The low cost carrier already serves Bergamo and Treviso in Italy from its Macedonian base. Over 78.000 Macedonians are believed to be residing in Italy. This winter, Alitalia is operating daily flights to Belgrade and three weekly services to Podgorica.
Great. Even fewer options for us to transfer with...
ReplyDeleteThey were pricey. RT was over 200 EUR
ReplyDelete200 eur is not expensive, just a normal fare
Delete64 EUR for a rtn are subsidized lure deals
What do you expect? It's a legacy airline. Don't get people who expect low cost prices from full fare airlines who happen to have a monopoly on a particular route.
DeleteEarly morning propaganda.
Delete'Subsidized' by 5 EUR per pax still results with 70 EUR fares. Keep your bloated inefficient operations for yourself.
We actually don't know the real rate of subsidies. There are many ways to siphon away money from taxpayers to LCCs.
DeleteWhat is clear is that Skopje business model completely chased away already 3 legacies only this year! What a "success"!
Wizz will increase its blackmail capacity.
And you can take a guess which legacy will even more monopolize the legacy market. Let me help you a little bit. It comes from the same country as the owners of the airport. What a "coincidence."
Actually, we do. It's all public, and on top of that TAV is a public company. The very combination of things requires for the 'subsidies' to exist in its current form. Otherwise it would have been a simple volume deal for new traffic as exists everywhere in the world.
DeleteI agree with the last paragraph though.
Delete=/
Guy, got a question. We always speak on subsidies for LCC. Why is AZ not going to Mac Gvrnment and asks for the same?
DeleteTx
Swiss coming back in SUTT 2017 with flts days 1,3,7 A320
DeleteWhat makes you think they didn't?
DeleteI am sure they negotiated before last option (complete suspension) is used.
They probably did not get what they wanted or needed to keep the service operative.
Safe to say that Wizz gets priority treatment just because of their volume that MK is not willing to grant to every other airline with small traffic numbers.
That was a bit unexpected and extreme. Suspending a route you fly to daily. Couldn't they have just reduced the frequencies?
ReplyDeleteObviously all is not good at Alitalia.
DeleteIt could be a disaster at AZ but the fact of the matter is they chose to suspend two routes and one of them was Skopje. Obviously wasn't performing well for them financially.
DeleteOnly legacy airlines now left in Skopje are Adria, Air Serbia, Austrian, Turkish and Croatia Airlines.
ReplyDeleteAJ & OU will be next to depart the Mac market.
DeleteAJ? You mean JP?
DeleteAlitalia's flights to BEG are completely packed and they were upgraded to A32S from the E75 which was the default equipment on the route just two years ago.
ReplyDeleteI just checked online and Air Serbia sells FCO-BEG-SKP for just €200 which is a really great deal.
FCO-BEG 20.40-22.15 A319
BEG-SKP 00.30-01.40 AT7
FCO-BEG 09.20-10.55 A319
BEG-SKP 13.25-14.35 AT7
Interesting that Alitalia is also offering Istanbul via Belgrade from 1 December with Air Serbia like with Skopje. They seem to have a codeshare on this route too. Good news for Air Serbia.
DeleteThey figured there's no point in fighting with an alliance partner over a low-yielding connecting market. I guess it makes sense when you're bleeding cash.
DeleteNemjee, P2P to Rome was never the market. That one's in the north of Italy.
Anyways, crap. Another connection gone, however unreliable. :( Now all I have left is PRN or BSL..
The little O&D there is between SKP and FCO will be best served via BEG. This comes as great news for JU as its SKP flights should see a boost.
DeleteI am still surprised AZ couldn't make SKP work. There should be enough local demand to fill at least three weekly flights on the Embraer.
JU has really shitty flying times, arriving in the middle of the night. And only one connection.
DeleteBig advantages for Austrian for example - with many connection options!
Wizz Air killing all competition.
ReplyDelete.. a njega će Ryan.
DeleteNormally, I would have agreed. No obvious overlap in this case though - you really have to stretch the argument to make it work.
DeleteI agree with Tranquilis here. There was no competition on this route. Wizz did not serve anything near FCO. I mean you could say Alitalia would have had more domestic transfers if Wizz was not operating between Skopje and Italy but that is a stretch. Maybe Wizz tries Rome now.
DeleteWhat a shame :(
ReplyDeleteJU JFK winter flights reduced in the last minute
ReplyDeleteAZ SKP flights suspended from daily to 0!
AB fleet reduction and loss of 1200 jobs.
Okay, is Etihad Group doing anything right? Excuse me, but Hogan can go back to his native Australia and/or change his job asap.
What a disaster! :( it makes me very angry.
I am really hoping JU will have a better 2017!
What does this have to do with JU? It launched several new routes this year. Reducing a route by two weekly flights compared to your summer high season operations is hardly a disaster.
DeleteIt sadly belongs to the EY group. It´s my personal opinion that´s all. I am not a big fan of Hogan. I think he´s making lots of mistakes and unaware of the market especially in Europe.
Deletewell Hogan has been effectively demoted. He has been named EY Group Chairman which is mostly a ceremonial role. I do agree with you though that all is not well within the EY group.
DeleteHogan gambled and kind of lost, no wonder he was moved to a ceremonial position.
DeleteI think it will hurt Etihad big time when AB goes belly up. Their credibility will be lost.
Basically each and every Etihad venture in EU are in shambles. They clearly do not have the money nor the expertise to turn them around.
DeleteArgh, that's my Christmas trip to Skopje in a mess from Glasgow! Originally GLA-AMS-FCO...
ReplyDeleteDid you book the ticket already? Did they contact you? :/
DeleteYup, booked and paid through Expedia (on phone to them now :P), hopefully will be able to switch to alternative route, I am coming back SKP-ZAG-AMS-GLA so maybe can use that route on the way!
DeleteGood luck. I'm sure they will let to you switch to another routing.
DeleteThanks! Hopefully but the first option Expedia suggested was an earlier flight on same route! Not sure the understand that it's not one FCO-SKP flight but all of them!
DeleteLet us know what they offer you in the end! Really curious how they work these things out.
DeleteThey offered a GLA-AMS-FCO-SKP for the same day (24th Dec) KLM operated by Alitalia on the FCO-SKP leg, I am still on the phone to them as I stated that Alitalia is not going to operate flights after 30th Nov so are they really sure that a flight will be on from FCO-SKP on that day!
DeleteThe other route is GLA-AMS-ZAG-SKP on the previous day but they need to check if they can provide that without incurring additional costs.
Update (if anyone is interested :P)
DeleteSo I have been booked onto a GLA-AMS-FCO-SKP flight operated entirely by KLM for my trip to Skopje on the 24th. I double checked and it is all on the same day.
I cannot seem to find this FCO-SKP flight on KLM website (or Alitalia). So I am unsure if KLM are putting on a replacement flight to cover for Alitalia cancellation?
I'll be calling KLM tomorrow to check that this isn't nonsense :)
Thanks for updating. The FCO-SKP leg with KLM seems a bit odd. I can't seem to find anything in the reservation system. Could be a replacement flight like you said.
DeleteHaha, you are right, it seemed odd as it doesn't exist! Received another call from Expedia, no replacement flight so I have had to cancel and will receive full refund (apparently :P).
DeleteSo back to my usual GLA-LTN-SKP with Easyjet and Wizz.
Damn you Alitalia!
Ah bad luck :/
DeleteCall Alitalia. They are obliged to offer you alternative route or refund you by EU laws. It does not matter where you bought your ticket.
DeleteThey are not obliged to do that only if they go bankrupt, and that is not the case.
Expedia have processed a full refund (takes up to 2 weeks!) so think that should be OK thanks!
DeleteYou won't believe this but the alternative offered by Aliltalia was FCO-SXF-BEG-SKP, making my potential trip GLA-AMS-FCO-SXF-BEG-SKP (a total of 46 hours of travelling by my checking). The guy at Expedia guessed correctly that would not be acceptable and offered a full refund :)
I was looking forward to trying this new route, so far I have used:
- Bus Glasgow to Manchester, MAN-SOF, bus to Skopje (same return)
- GLA-LGW-ZAG-SKP (Easyjet/OU)
- GLA-LTN-SKP (Easyjet/Wizz)
I dream of a Skopje connected to AMS/LGW, would be best for connecting GLA flights :)
Try GLA-SOF, there are 2 flights per week.
DeleteI am surprised Austrian or Turkish don't provide connections to Glaswgow/Edinburgh??
DeleteYou can indeed try SOF from Glasgow or from Northern England (Manchester, Liverpool or Doncaster)
Yeah just saw that GLA-SKP flight, doesn't suit the days I would like to fly there (work, men), but return not bad.
DeleteRE Austrian,they tend to by a few hundred Euros more per person that the routes listed surprisingly and never seen Turkish as an option (I think the destinations are seasonal to the coast from Scotland to Turkey).
Yup Northern England may be a shout, just when you factor in getting there it can be about the same when weighing up cost/hassle!
This is getting ridiculous. I would not be surprised if the only airline serving Skopje in a few years is Wizz Air.
ReplyDeleteOh, no worries, not even Wizz Air. If we judge by the expert comments on this blog, as soon as the billion $$$ subsidies end, they will be gone, never to return, leaving SKP with the real traffic they deserve, a double daily JU.
Delete@9:51am Hahahaha i really had do LOL because of your comment :D
DeleteWho even mentioned JU? I'm just saying that in a matter of weeks SKP has lost CSA, Swiss and now Alitalia. I wouldn't be surprised if the likes of Air Serbia or Croatia Airlines were next.
DeleteI don't get it. The moment someone makes a joke or a snarky comment it's immediately followed by an attack on Serbia. Jesus Christ.
DeleteAnon 09.51 I suppose you meant a double daily flight to IST on TK. ;)
Sorry Nemjee, you nailed it :))) You can imagine where that comes from though. I'm sure you get it.
DeleteI correct myself - double daily to IST on TK! LOL.
I understand but at the same time Air Serbia isn't that strong in SKP. Having night flights in winter is a step in the right direction but I still think they should be able to operate 10 weekly year-round. Maybe if they lowered BEG-SKP fares they would get some more O&D passengers.
Delete
Delete"...leaving SKP with the real traffic they deserve, a double daily JU "
to me this is neither funny nor a snarky comment.
But, obviously Serbs have their own sense of Humor, which I totally do not get.
Kad budete imali svoju aviokompaniju razumeces. Uostalom i Crnogorci ce uskoro da ugase svoju. Ne placaju vise radnike. Neka se spremi CTN.
Deleteand having an own national Airline is a prerequisite for what exactly?
DeleteTo being a fabulous, strong and kick ass country!
Deleteand that is a type of Country Serbia is?
DeleteU odnosu na Makedoniju da, mnogo bogatija vegetacijom. Zelenilo bre.
DeleteNemjee, one more time - what on earth are you talking about?
DeleteI think that this region in particular now sees much more supply vs. demand. Here are some examples of the situation of other nearby airports:
ReplyDeleteINI went from zero to hero - it now has 9 destinations!
OHD has now 2-3 all-year round destinations
SOF went from 50 to over 70 destinations!
PRN sees arrival of important carriers such as U2, DY and seasonal SK plus is connected to primary cities.
So, SKP will rely heavily on W6, who no doubt, will base a 4th a/c in the near future.
+1
DeleteOT
ReplyDeleteINI welcomed 16.500 passengers in October, 81.723 in 2016.
Current loadfactor on all flights is around 90%.
They expect 120.000 passengers in 2016, 100.000th passenger is expected by the end of November while next year they expect 300.000 passengers.
During Christmas holidays, Wizz Air has added extra flights from Dortmund while Ryanair added more flights from both Berlin and Bratislava.
Yesterday in an interview Ryanair CEO said that their priority is to increase market share,not to make profit. They decided to sell all seats, even if they are losing money.
DeleteThat's called dumping and it is an illegal practice. I hope someone sues them this time.
Can you please enlighten us with the name of the law that says privately owned business can't do this?
DeleteI think you are mixing this with price fixing.
I also don't see how this is illegal.
DeleteSo, a private company is selling seats at 10 EUR and still making loss - this is illegal. A government owned airline is selling tickets at 300 EUR and still can't pay airport charges (JU) or needs yearly multimillion government injections (JP) - fully legal.
Logic is difficult sometimes.
I think people here sometimes mix things being illigal (i.e. you can pay a fine or go to jail for) with what is common sense.
DeleteAny business owner, including government in your example can do whatever it wants with his company or companies in this case. They signed a contract with the private company where they agreed to jointly provide certain amount of capital upfront. GoS decided to fund it's portion through ASL not paying anything to the other entity to owns (i.e. BEG airport). Nothing wrong with that either.
True, but we have problem here
DeleteEtihad investment 40 million + 60 million loan
Serbia "investment" 158 million till now (without debts deleted).
What proportion or logic is that?
There is no logic in that at all. If the original conract said 100 million for 51% but they decided to invest 158 for the same amount of equity instead,that's plain stupid. I'd love to have them jnveat in my bussines.
DeleteOn the other hand none of know full contract terms so this conversation is a bit pointless.
But the point of one of the posts above was that dumping is illegal and that's not true. Price fixing is in most of the vountris bu this just isn't.
Dumping is forbidden - illegal. It does not matter whether the company that does it is private or state-owned.
DeleteWhy? Because it strongly favors big companies and monopolies, and it an artificial way to get rid of the competition, so that you can dictate the rules afterwards.
If they are sued and they loose the case, in addition to a heavy fine, they could be ordered to split company in two or three separate entities.
Anon 10:17
DeletePlease show me one court case, anywhere in the world where the company was fined for selling their products at "dumping" levels
Another one bites the dust
ReplyDeleteIt will be interesting to see if Wizz Air starts this route. Talking about legacy airlines, I find it odd that Lufthansa has never flown to Skopje. Any particular reason?
ReplyDeleteIt was handed over to Austrian Airlines which is the Group's expert for ex-Yugoslavia.
DeleteAdria ...simply
DeleteThat's not correct!! LH was flying MUC-SKP daily from late 90's till 2001! After PRN was opened they never came back.
DeleteAnd Cirrus Airlines (LH Partner back then) was serving SKP from FRA on a daily basis with a LH codeshare. It lasted from 2002 till 2005-2006 when it went bankruptcy.
DeleteIt is sad to see them and Swiss go. I really hope they reconsider down the line. Is Skopje looking to attract any other national airline? Maybe Air France-Klm?
ReplyDeleteNope, during a recent press conference management said they were happy with what htey have now and the only change might be FR.
DeleteShame :( I do believe there is potential for some more airlines other than LCCs.
DeleteThat view might be outdated now.
DeleteAdria will benefit out of this as well as LJU
ReplyDeleteAlitalia is leaving Istanbul Ataturk as well. It's interesting and weird in a way that Air Serbia's route to Istanbul is its worst by far, the planes are unbearably empty.
ReplyDeleteHow is it weird if so many European airlines have suspended IST - Austrian, Alitalia and Swiss. Also KLM has halved its flights to IST this winter, SAS has reduced frequencies... Obviously demand is not there. Air Serbia will benefit from the Alitalia suspension since Alitalia has codeshare on BEG-IST-BEG.
DeleteDemand is there- its just hardly anybody can compete with TK
DeleteIt is difficult enough to compete against TK on their home turf. It is obviously impossible to compete there if the Turkish state does everything possible to skew the market in TK interest.
DeleteNot only that, there isn't just TK but PC, Onur Air...
Delete&AnonymousNovember 8, 2016 at 11:53 AM
DeleteYeah, you are right, but PC and TK figures in Belgrade are growing.
It's not because of the competition with TK. That would be easier than ever as all turkish airlines are sinking rapidly.
DeleteIt's because if security concerns. When you have airport under mortar fire like SAW and the authorities try to cover it with lies passengers just do not want to fly there any more and airlines can not risk their assets (crew and aircraft). Wizz withdrawn their BUD-SAW for the same reason.
In the meantime, they're building a third airport that may never come to use.
DeleteHahaha Turkish carriers as well as their economy is starting to bounce back. There is a difference between reality and wishful thinking.
DeleteYes, you can be happy with the russian tourists in AYT as no one else is going there. Might as well be the one of the lucky passengeres TK kills once in every 5 years with their regular crashes.
DeleteNe znam na kojoj osnovi ovaj tvrdi da su AS letovi za Istanbul prazni? Da su prepuni, nisu ali evo pogledao sam LF ovu celu sedmicu i skoro ni jedan let nije ispod 64%..cak preko vikenda je oko 80..samo toliko
ReplyDeleteDa, mozda 64% ali na Atr-u... lol
DeletePritom i sam znas da je IST loss making linija. Ili si propustio sastanak u cetvrtak. ;)
Can you also see the LF for other routes maybe the one to ZAG SJJ OTP SOF?
Delete@2:00PM - Икакве вести за нове дестинације? Коју су још јако лоше линије?
DeleteAnon 3.11
DeleteSto se finansija tice apsolutno AUH iako je relativno ok popunjenost. Nista spektakularno ali ok je.
Ostalo je manje vise u redu, od kako su ukinute WAW i BUD nema vise kriminalnih linija, cak je i BNX ok.
MUC is being considered as a new destination, seasonal at first.
DeleteMUC seasonal? Are they on something? They will get destroyed by Lufthansa and Wizz Air.
DeleteYou people believe anything any anonymous writes.
DeleteNooo sad to see Alitalia go :(
ReplyDeleteSo, the sole primary destinations left will be: ZRH, IST, BCN, CPH, DXB! :( So, if AZ leaves, then most likely JU will operate 3-4 daily flights, they currently have 2.
ReplyDeleteALO, 3-4 daily flights ?!?!
DeleteYes, why not? Just like TGD, what's the problem?
DeleteWhat happened with JU's flight to Skopje last night? It got diverted and cancelled. Which A/C was involved?
ReplyDeleteWeather. During night hours you can not land from north due to terrain but southern approach was not possible for tailwind over the minima.
DeleteThis is why Macedonia needs a national airline ASAP. No matter the costs, since so much money is already being spent on lots of stupidities.
ReplyDeleteImpeccable logic! Come and take my money please!
DeleteWhy not? If they were able to waste that much money to create a mix of Baku and Las Vegas in the city center, why wouldn't they waste some more money and do something useful.
DeleteAlitalia livery on Embraer E175 looks awesome. Really cool in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that, almost every livery looks good on these Embraer birds.
OT:
ReplyDeleteBoeing 747-446 Atlas Air (Reg: N464MC) just departed PRN to HHN.
Nice.
DeleteThis is not tragic!
ReplyDeleteSkopje as the centar of a poor country has really narrow potential. To profit best from this potential is to make a package of LCC carriers. Skopje needs one more player besides Wizz (possible: Ryan, Easyjet, German-/Eurowings, Germania, Transavia or Vueling) to base at least one aircraft there. For the Russian market (non EU) there would be nice Pobeda would fly twice a week (like Flydubai for Middleeast market and Pegasus for Little Asia).
What would cover Macedonian needs and maximize the potencial for tourists and business traveller:
Vienna double daily (westtraffic)
Istanbul double daily (easttraffic)
Pegasus 3x weekly
Pobeda 2x weekly
Flydubai2x weekly
Wizz (all Eu-Countries)
Ryan (all Eu-Countries)
some charters-offereres in the summer would come from Turkey/Tunesia... and the rest, seasonal by the LCC (Wizz and Ryan) like Malta, Spain, Italy, Croatia, Bulgaria...