NEWS FLASH
Air Serbia and Aegean Airlines are expanding their codeshare partnership with the Greek carrier to reinstate its flight numbers and designator code onto its Serbian counterparts’ operations from Belgrade to Dubrovnik and Sarajevo. Codesharing on these routes was suspended last year. Furthermore, Aegean will put its flight numbers onto Air Serbia’s services from Belgrade to Rijeka and Trieste, which will commence next month. In return, Air Serbia will begin codesharing on Aegean’s fights from Athens to Tel Aviv and Cairo, which the Serbin carrier served from its hub with its own equipment until the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and has not restored them since.
I finde codesharing options quite, quite expensive on Air Serbia website
ReplyDeleteTrue dat. I find it is always cheeper to book through A3's website. It shows options for all booking classes, through JU it is only the most expensive/flexible fares.
DeleteLet's take a look at flights to TLV since that's where we have non-stop flights from BEG (unlike CAI).
ReplyDeleteOne way fares and travel times a month from today 27/28.05:
Non-stop
Arkia €167 travel time: 02.50
Cheapest with a stop
Aegean €105 05.40 // €172 with JU code-share
Pegasus €158 03.05
Tarom from €178 codeshare with JU 12.55
Air Serbia/ITA €257 09.00
Turkish Airlines €264 09.40
Air Serbia/Aegean €383 12.35
Basically this code-share with Aegean via ATH to TLV makes no sense. Not only is it the most expensive connection offered (without backtracking) but it's almost twice as expensive compared to what Aegean is offering on its own metal with a much shorter travel time. What I don't get is how come Aegean is cheaper when combining JU and A3 to TLV than what JU is offering via its own website?! What's funny is that JU writes on their website (Преостало: 4 седишта!). Oh yeah because this is such a fantastic deal that it shouldn't be missed. LOL to eternity and back.
Naturally Arkia is the most competitive one since they are the only non-stop option so they can dictate the fare policy. While looking at flights on their website, I noticed that they have more or less doubled the number of flights to BEG. Demand seems to be coming back so who knows, maybe we get LY back. Air Serbia doesn't seem to interested in this market which is a shame. Actually, now that I think of it, they seem to be out of the Israeli market right now, either with their own metal or through code-share partners. I mean their fares via OTP are relatively ok but who wants to travel for 13 hours when you can fly on Aegean for much less and much faster.
I wonder if Arkia is incresaing flights because of special program from BEG
DeleteExcluding the war periods, this is the first time in over 50 years that JU is not flying to the Middle East.
Delete+1
DeleteSo basically Marek's biggest achievements so far are terminating Middle East flights after 5 to 6 decades and bragging about operating so many charters in markets where they are protected by bilaterals?
DeleteThis is Tarom last night:
Delete00.30 CAI B737
00.30 АММ B738
00.50 BEY B737
How can they make these work with a similar schedule like JU but Air Serbia can't?
These JU codeshare arrangements are useless in terms of pricing; I doubt that they ever sold any of these flights.
ReplyDeleteAs a government owned airline there is probably little to no accountability. What matters is just to do something, to create an illusion that something is being done. I'd love for Marek to explain to me how they think they can compete with these travel times and fares. Or is this what he meant by being Wizzier than Wizz.
DeleteJU has officially declared defeat in the Middle East. The transfer market with Europe will be handled by LO, OS, TK and A3.
ReplyDeleteAir Serbia should focus on PSO from KVO and INI. That seems to be their level these days.
AS will have about 1000 charter flights and introduced more than 10 new destinations, it's renewing its fleet and it's making huge progress, especially compared to other ex yu companies. They have 2 hubs now and fly to 3 airports in Serbia.
DeleteAmman was canceled probably due to low sales or simply there were more profitable things to do than sending an airplane for 7 hours and not making a profit. Middle east is not as attractive as it seems, Israel is closed off due to covid restrictions, Lebanon is in a crisis, Syria...do I need to say anything. Cyprus and Turkey remained their only middle eastern destinations which is totally fine.
AS is not perfect but it is making progress.
Over 1000 charter flights to highly regulated markets where they face minimal competition.
Delete@15,16
DeleteAnnounced routes from BEG were :
AER, RJK, BRI, BLQ, VLC, PMI, AER, AMM, SLZ, NUE, HAJ, LYS, TRS.
- AER never got rights and will not operate. To this list we should add KRR and ROV which are also not going to operate.
- RJK isn't new, it's a pre covid destination relaunched in 2019 that they tried to make year round but ended up becoming seasonal.
- AMM canceled...again.
Also to this list we have NCE that was supposed to operate this summer but was canceled.
They have 2 hubs due to government fixed tenders for JU, not due to smart business decisions. It didn't work the first time so that was changed.
Israel is "closed off" however we have a variety of European carriers operating to TLV, including RO.
Lebanon might be in crisis but RO and LO seem to be making BEY work.
Charters will peak for 3 months, and then what? What happens with additional capacity for the other 9 months? JU has an advantage with Middle East markets because most of them can be operated as turn around flights, meaning crew don't need to layover. BEG doesnt have curfews so late night departures aren't a problem. Demand is there, not just O&D but especially transfers. JU pulling out of the ME for the first time in decades is concerning.
Actually JU got the permit for Sochi, they just decided not to go for it because of politics.
DeleteAlso how come Arkia is successful in Belgrade but JU thinks there is no money to be made on BEG-TLV?
1000 charter flights will carry at best 150.000 pax. That is peanuts compared to the total number of Serbians who will travel abroad for Summer holidays.
DeleteTrue but I believe JU carries a great deal of holidaymakers on its scheduled flights (PMI, FCO, BCN, IST ...).
DeleteMeni licno nije jasno zasto se zapostavlja Bliski Istok i delovi Afrike kad se mogao lepi posao da napravi.
ReplyDeleteINN-NS