No easy ride for Niki
Austrian and Jat Airways have united forces in order to protect their monopoly on the Vienna – Belgrade – Vienna service which they have held for years. The 2 will face tough competition from the Austrian based low cost Niki, which will begin services from Vienna to Belgrade on February 1. Austrian has negotiated with Jat and decided to launch 4 extra weekly services. The airline’s new flights will depart from Vienna in the evening and depart from Belgrade at 4.40 in the morning. However, Jat is negotiating to shift the departure time from Belgrade to a more suitable morning hour. Jat Airways will code share on all 4 additional flights.On the other hand, Jat Airways will increase capacity on services to Vienna. The airline will upgrade 4 of its weekly flights from an ATR72 to a Boeing B737-300. Austrian will also codeshare on these flights.
The 2 airlines will have 31 weekly flights from Belgrade to Vienna from February 1, 2010 when the extra frequencies commence. Austrian and Jat are hoping to extinguish the competition they face from Niki. A return ticket with Austrian/Jat will set passengers back 107 Euros including all taxes.
Meanwhile, Romania’s TAROM will begin services from Bucharest to Belgrade soon. Jat Airways will codeshare on the service.
doesnt surprise me. the austrian airfare mentioned makes the tickets more than 50% cheaper compared to what it was for the summer. €220 was the return airfare BEGVIE during the summer!!! Would of liked to see JAT add the extra frequencies to VIE.
ReplyDeletethis morning saw a billboard for a tourist agency who seems will be working with Malev, who are also offer cheaper flights throughout Europe
HA, I doubt if OS's cost structure would help run this price war in the long run. Plus, I presume a fair amount of traffic on their metals will be fed through Vienna to other parts of the world. I smell a really nasty battle to kill the O&D numbers of Niki.
ReplyDeleteIt's good that JU and OS are working together, i was afraid that in this Belgrade-Vienna market JU would suffer...
ReplyDeleteGreat news...
There is no news on Lufty and their services to Belgrade, I am sure they have a nice surprise for us, or are they going to keep the frequencies like they are now..?
The extra frequencies begin January 10.
ReplyDeleteAs for LH, they have decided to let OS run the business for the whole group in Serbia (OS, LH, LX)...
Competition is a bitch, eh Jat?
ReplyDeleteJokes aside, I will criticize Jat everywhere I can, but I will congratulate them on the decision to sell tickets at 19 Euros as part of this Serbia-you-are-now-free-to-live-like-normal-people EU program.
It took a long time, but the news are fantastic!
Actually, it's something they wouldn't be allowed to advertise in civilized Europe... maybe it's 19 EUR (one way) WITHOUT the fuel surcharges, ticket service charges, airport taxes, etc.
ReplyDeleteSure they are. That is exactly how low cost airlines operate. They give you a one-way price of the ticket only and then they tack-on surcharges. In Jat's defense, they did state that it is one way and that it does not include the surcharges...but, the point is that they are trying to match low-cost airlines' offers.
ReplyDeleteI am surprised that some of you think that this is good thing. Yes it is good move for OU and JU but less fight between companies is always bad for the end customer.
ReplyDeleteOne correction. I went to Jat's site to check out the actual price. One way ticket from Belgrade to Frankfurt is 134.6 Euro on Dec 22. Given an airline ticket of 19 Euro, surcharges amount to 115.6 Euro. WFT?
ReplyDeleteI guess in this Visa-free travel euphoria, I've jumped the gun a little. Jat is still not a good choice!
The promotional tickets don't go on sale until December 1 so they are not in the system yet.
ReplyDeleteAh well I suppose with 2 daily to FRA and 3 daily to MUC there isn't much more for LH... But I read that they will increase their capacity, i doubt that they will change their FRA 733/735 but maybe upgreade their MUC flight...
ReplyDeleteCould we see SK launching flights? There are a lot of Serbs living up there and with the visas removed they could fly at least from CPH
If JU upgreades the VIE route, where will they use the ATR?
ReplyDeleteБЕЛИ ШЕНГЕН!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDelete@ anonymous
SK have already tried BEG a couple years back but left due to a lack of profit. They tried it with Snowflake too. JAT offer flights to CPH, ARN and GOT while Norweigan Air Shuttle offer OSL and ARN.
@ anonymous
Many european airports have high taxes which is why the taxes are soo high. BEG has high taxes but will become lower next year. I was surprised trying to find flights to MEL from BEG that going via say CDG or FRA taxes were much more higher compared to going via DXB.
@ anonymous
maybe FRA will be upgraded to A320/A321 and MUC to LH B735's maybe once daily :)
But the time when SAS did fly and snowflake as well, there were visas. Now that there is free travel we could expect better loads on the routes.
ReplyDeleteDid Jat's sale begin? This morning I was looking at the tickets and they seem normal to me
@ anonymous
ReplyDeletei doubt it. SK atm codeshares on LH flights, i guess thats enough. we have visa liberation, thats true, but we need higher wages to be able to travel ;)
Those flight times won't be changed. A late evening departure and a 0440 return is because that aircraft would normally be overnight at VIE. If the fares are cheap enough at that time, there'll be bums on seats and the service will remain.
ReplyDeleteIs anyone really that surprised that two 'legacy' carriers who are struggling financially are fighting back against genuine competition?
@ Ex-YU
The times for the TAROM service are oddly the same given for the flights which never started to ZAG. Any word as to why they never went ahead?
@ Zrak
OS (Austrian) rather than OU (Croatia Airlines)? OU isn't starting at BEG until next May...