LOT Polish Airlines has suspended three of its destinations in the former Yugoslavia over the 2020/2021 winter season, which began today, until March 28, 2021. The carrier will not fly between its hub in Warsaw to Skopje, Podgorica and Dubrovnik. Services to the Macedonian and Montenegrin capitals have not operated since mid-March, while Dubrovnik was served during most of the summer. Flights between Warsaw and the Croatian coastal city were maintained on a year-round basis in 2019. Furthermore, LOT has extended the suspension of its Ljubljana service until December 1. Flights were initially to resume today. Further changes remain possible.
The Polish carrier will continue to serve Zagreb and Belgrade in the former Yugoslavia over the coming months. Flights to the Croatian capital will run five times per week with the Embraer E175 jet, which has the capacity to seat 82 passengers, while services to Belgrade will operate four times per week with the same aircraft type. LOT, which relies on a notable number of transfer passengers on its routes from EX-YU markets, particularly to the United States and Canada, is, for the most part, unable to serve this segment due to entry restrictions. “I believe that the return of our hub-and-spoke model from 2019 will be possible in the summer of 2022”, LOT’s CEO, Rafal Milczarski, said.
LOT expects to carry some three million passengers this year, down from over ten million in 2019. The carrier anticipates welcoming five million travellers on board its aircraft next year, including a million passengers on charter flights. “We have the instruments to survive. LOT will apply for state aid, just like any other airline in Europe. We need it and we hope to receive it before the end of the year. We will create a model that will optimise our costs and operations”, LOT’s CEO noted. Poland does not allow entry into its country from most nations outside the European Union.
What is the financial situation at LO?
ReplyDeleteBefore the Covid crisis they seemed to be doing great.
Well they are seeking state aid so...
DeleteThey pretend to be doing great as with all state owned entities in Poland. However, the budget deficit grows. LOT pretends to grow to justify the planned 60M passenger airport for Warsaw to be built mostly for LOT.
DeleteI hope they come back on these routes.
ReplyDeleteThey will but not before March.
DeleteSituation is getting bad. Even LH cancelled tonight's FRA ZAG.
DeleteDoes Poland still have those silly flight bans for certain countries?
ReplyDeleteI think they gave up on those.
DeleteThe flight ban is still there. Out of ex-Yu at present it applies only to Bosnia, Montenegro and Macedonia. Thus the cancellations (or, actually, lack of resumption of the flights).
DeleteThere is no flight ban to Slovenia though. But I'm not sure if anyone can even enter Slovenia.
DeleteRight now they are many restrictions in place to enter Slovenia. If you are arriving from Poland you need a negative covid test or a 10 days quarantine is mandatory.
DeleteCovid is rampant in Slovenia so not the right time for flying there, unless you have an emergency task to perform.
Considering they can't carry almost anyone to US and Canada, and people from Montenegro and Macedonia can't enter Warsaw, it makes sense
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteMontenegro has allowed Americans since Mid August with negative Covid tests. U.S. citizens and permanent residents have been using the Vienna-TGD route with Austrian Airlines. Americans are banned from entering Austria but can still connect through Vienna and on to Montenegro. LOT could still benefit for those wanting to go to Montenegro for transit passengers. I as U.S. citizen flew from the United States transited through Vienna with Austrian Airlines on to Podgorica in August.
Deletewhy are the Montenegro-airports keeping their pax numbers a secret this year ? :)
ReplyDeleteits not like the others are making some growth
Last figures I have (June, July) TGD had minus 90% both months.
DeleteThat explains why they are not publishing them.
Deletethx i couldnt find any on their airports webpage
DeleteRoutes that made no sense anyway.
ReplyDeleteMade perfect sense
DeleteAnd how they dont make sense?
Deletelol dont bother with mr.notorious
DeleteYou always come back to write the same mr notorious comment. I agree with him, if they made sense then they wouldn't have struggled from the start. These are just too small and seasonal markets.
DeleteFrom where did you get the idea that "they struggled from the start"?? In fact these two routes were upgraded from seasonal to year round. I'm sure LOT didn't upgrade them for the fun of it. But I guess you know better.
Deleteyeh you know they have struggled from the start lol.
Deletethey even scheduled Tivat and Ohrid this summer. you dont start additional routes in the same countries if you are not satisfied with the previous ones. the stuff you read here
DeleteThe fact that LO was overly abmitious and funded by the Polish government doesn't mean there was economical sense to fly them.
DeleteAfter all LO is not an European TK and is hundreds of miles away from its Balkan markets unlike TK.
You probably don't know, but unless you fly to southern Asia or Australia, IST is not very good located for the Balkans. From ZAG on a great circle mapper: to WAW 799 km, to IST 1159 km. Exemplary route: ZAG-IST-NCE (Nice) 2959 km. ZAG-WAW-NCE 2192 km. Obviously, if we chose final destination more to the north than NCE, the difference would be even bigger to the disadvantage of IST.
Deletethe TK fanboy @15.37 lol as if TK is not overly ambitious and not funded by Erdo. stuff you read here
DeleteDoubt LJU will resume in December.
ReplyDeleteMe neither. In December they will cancel it till March.
DeleteI read that the Visegrand group has suggested for LOT to become the netional airline of Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. Prague Airport also confirmed LOT will open a base there. Perhaps they will start some more ex-Yu routes.
ReplyDeleteFrom Prague probably. Currently in both SPU and DBV Smartwings is holding all the pax.
DeletePrague is perfect for LCC
DeletePrague is a huge city. It is perferct destination to both legacy and LCC airlines.
DeleteSo LOT will become a flag carrier of all 4 countries?
DeleteAnon 12:03
DeleteNot actually. These 4 are planing to establish joint national carrier with LOT being the leader in that project.
Won't ever happen. LOT already have a very bad reputation in Hungary after the first years of their base in Budapest before covid (constant delays/cancellations, poor customer service, long-haul advertised with 787 but operated with crappy leased 767s etc). They cut the base to three routes by now.
DeleteLast anon. They are keeping their long-haul to Seul from Budapest for the winter, despite the pandemic. A clear sign that what you say is fully right and in particular that they see no place for themselves in Budapest and that they only plan to pull back;) Last winter they had three weekly on this route and planned to increase to four weekly from spring.
DeletePrague is a huge city?
DeleteLOL.
Prague has like 1 million inhabitants or the size of Chisinau.
Yes, Seoul once a week, Wroclaw once a week and Warsaw twice daily. A glorious base indeed. Budapest is their goldmine for sure.
DeleteNowadays no pax airline is cash positive/profitable. Everybody needs to be patient. Being impatient hurts as you bleed too much money. You have to plan long term and prepare. So we shall see in five years.
DeleteAnon 15:38
DeleteDo you knew anything about numbers higher then 10 before you made a comment. If you knew, you would now number 600.000 is not equal to 1 million.
You mean 700.000?
DeleteRegardless, that's way more accurate than saying Prague is a 'huge' city.
Still, millions would like to visit Prague every year while no one on this green Earth would ever like to see Chisinau. Understandably.
DeleteThey expect just 5 million next year compared to 3 this year? Yikes
ReplyDeleteWell things are probably not going to get better until the middle of next year. I think it's realistic.
DeleteNMK makes sense. After all, demand has been generally decreasing since Wizz downsized their base before Covid.
ReplyDeleteIt will take some time to recover LO.
Haha!
DeleteWhat a load of rubbish anon @9.57
DeleteThey were supposed to fly SKP and TGD 6 weekly in the summer, so they did just fine.
DeleteAnd Wizz didn't downsize their base before Covid.
Yes it did. Significant capacity were taken away from SKP by replacing the two 321 based there with 320s. In 2019, way before the virus.
Deletethey launched SZG and were preparing Ancona for 2020 ... wait til the new tender
DeleteTaking in consideration that CRO passport holders can freely travel through EU and SRB can't this is big success for BEG airport.
ReplyDeleteSerbian passport holder can also freely enter in Poland.
Delete^ Not true @12.10. Please don't spread false claims.
DeletePoland remains open only for EU citizens. He is right.
DeleteEntry into Poland is allowed only for essential travel (a closed list of reasons). Free entry (also for non-essential travel) is basically allowed only for citizens or holders of the stay permit of the countries belonging to European Economic Area, Switzerland and Belarus. This limitation does not apply to transfer pax, as they are not entering Poland.
DeleteNo quarantine on air arival, unless on an inbound flight from Russia, Ukraine or Belarus.
Well done BEG!
DeleteWell Americans are allowed in Serbia and Montenegro. Montenegro has allowed Americans since Mid August with negative Covid tests. U.S. citizens and permanent residents have been using the Vienna-TGD route with Austrian Airlines. Americans are banned from entering Austria but can still connect through Vienna and on to Montenegro. LOT could still benefit for those wanting to go to Montenegro for transit passengers.
ReplyDeleteI hope they come back. They had very good fares.
ReplyDeleteAnd this year they were actually supposed to introduce 4 new routes :/
ReplyDeleteBudapest - Belgrade
Rzeszow - Zadar
Budapest - Dubrovnik
Warsaw - Rijeka
And LJU was supposed to increase to 8 weekly in the summer... Sad indeed.
DeleteThis year they introduced more then ever routes to Croatia.
Delete@20:13
DeleteWhat do you mean with "supposed to introduce"? I don't know for the others, but I saw LO at RJK with my own eyes, this summer
Love LOT. A pity
ReplyDeleteI agree. Good company. Something like CSA used to be.
DeleteThey said themselves a earlier this year (there was an article here) that their ex-Yu network is based on their transfer strategy. So it's no surprise these routes have been suspended.
ReplyDeleteNever used them before. What is their service like?
ReplyDeleteThey were really great, flew with them earlier this week
DeleteYou have some trip reports on the site here
Deletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2020/01/trip-report-lot-london-zagreb-via-warsaw.html
https://www.exyuaviation.com/2020/05/trip-report-lot-skopje-new-york-via.html
I flew LOT 787 and economy seats are narrowest in the sky. That was a LOT of pain. Never again.
ReplyDeleteI don't know, what is your preference, but their new, modern fleet of B787 is much better than that of their main regional competitor OS.
DeleteMy preference is 8 across in economy on a 787.
DeleteBarring that, wider seats. Seatguru has LOT as the narrow economy seat on a 787-8 at 16.9 in, British Airways has 17.5 in 787-8. LOT gave me a LOT of pain during those 8-9 hours. Never ever again with LOT. Call me when you change eco seats width.
8 across? So only airline you want fly with 787 is JAL? 8 across on 787 is the best eco configuration in the sky but it is important to know that there are many airlines which have 9 across on 787 but with very good wideness. Like SQ or Qantas. And also you should know LOT has newer seats on some 787-9s so you might have better expirience with them.
Delete