TUI Airways

[Flybeboy]

Cuts are from april 19 till end of year 19 will go is palma, tenerife, Lpa rome, plus new York stewart, Boston usa.. A big cut. Yes this will need tui to need to replace them so cover in-house or air europa alba star gets they are very used routes from Exeter so they will be replaced asap. If they can find a airline to do it. Loosing the flights will lose TUI lots of money..So they will wanted replaced asap.

 

[Flybeboy]

Confirmed by TUI to me as we were thinking of going LPA has been cancelled this summer 2019 due to Norwegian . Asked about tenerife as a option. Told this still ops .bad news for exeter

 

[737 400]

Just checked the TUI website this afternoon.

Nothing currently shown for EXT-LPA during this summer, however service resumes with a TUI B737 from 7th October.

EXT-TFS still shown as resourced by Norwegian for this summer.

 

[Jerry]

Wonder if they'll do TFS on a W pattern from Gatwick?

 

[737 400]

Wonder if they'll do TFS on a W pattern from Gatwick?

I would have thought crew hours would be an issue on a long W pattern rotation, especially where flying time is approx four hours on each segment.

 

[Jerry]

I would have thought crew hours would be an issue on a long W pattern rotation, especially where flying time is approx four hours on each segment.

I'd have thought they would have to have new crew at Exeter waiting but still a long drive home to Gatwick.

 

[737 400]

I'd have thought they would have to have new crew at Exeter waiting but still a long drive home to Gatwick.

That would incur additional costs such as a large taxi/minibus to ferry a complete set of crew from Gatwick to EXT and likewise for the inbound set of crew returning back from EXT to home base at Gatwick. A nice taxi/minibus bill each Tuesday for the accountants to riot about and plenty of non-productive crew hours, assuming that total shift length, including travelling time in taxi/minibus, is within permitted hours! That's a situation which any airline will want to avoid, especially during the summer timetable period, when resources are already at a premium!

Don't forget that if a Norwegian aircraft is being used, then Norwegian crews will have to be provided and like any other airline, resources don't just suddenly appear out of thin air....

Just saying....

 

[Foxlimayankee]

That would incur additional costs such as a large taxi/minibus to ferry a complete set of crew from Gatwick to EXT and likewise for the inbound set of crew returning back from EXT to home base at Gatwick. A nice taxi/minibus bill each Tuesday for the accountants to riot about and plenty of non-productive crew hours, assuming that total shift length, including travelling time in taxi/minibus, is within permitted hours! That's a situation which any airline will want to avoid, especially during the summer timetable period, when resources are already at a premium!

Don't forget that if a Norwegian aircraft is being used, then Norwegian crews will have to be provided and like any other airline, resources don't just suddenly appear out of thin air....

Just saying....

You'd be surprised how often this happens in the industry. TUI do it a fair bit around the country. Most Airlines will have contracts with firms at reasonable rates if it's regular, and local hotels if it's required. It's not that much of a cost in comparison to the profit the flight should make to keep the contract.
There's a number of ways to make it work if they have to;
- position the aircraft in from LGW with a full crew and operate it as EXT-TFS-EXT then empty back to LGW. Should be enough hours in the day for 1 set of crew.
- W pattern from LGW-TFS-EXT vv. And road the crews. Likely they will need a hotel stop in EXT.
- Night stop the crews in TFS, again commonly done by Airlines. Both TUI and TCX have done this is past winters and operated an aircraft that overnights in TFS.
- Cancel it completely and offer BRS-TFS as an alternative. Which I can't see happening given the popularity of TFS.
I can't see TUI wanting to take on another aircraft just to operate a 1 weekly EXT-TFS and BOH-TFS, plus any fleet plans for the coming summer should be pretty much firmed up by now.

 

[737 400]

You'd be surprised how often this happens in the industry. TUI do it a fair bit around the country. Most Airlines will have contracts with firms at reasonable rates if it's regular, and local hotels if it's required. It's not that much of a cost in comparison to the profit the flight should make to keep the contract.
There's a number of ways to make it work if they have to;
- position the aircraft in from LGW with a full crew and operate it as EXT-TFS-EXT then empty back to LGW. Should be enough hours in the day for 1 set of crew.
- W pattern from LGW-TFS-EXT vv. And road the crews. Likely they will need a hotel stop in EXT.
- Night stop the crews in TFS, again commonly done by Airlines. Both TUI and TCX have done this is past winters and operated an aircraft that overnights in TFS.
- Cancel it completely and offer BRS-TFS as an alternative. Which I can't see happening given the popularity of TFS.
I can't see TUI wanting to take on another aircraft just to operate a 1 weekly EXT-TFS and BOH-TFS, plus any fleet plans for the coming summer should be pretty much firmed up by now.

Will be interesting to see how resourcing EXT-TFS pans out for the summer and resourcing from Gatwick is only pure speculation.

You are quite correct in saying how often this happens in the industry and so far as I know, TUI use MAN based flight crews out based for several days at a time to resource their year round flights from EXT, flying passenger to/from MAN on a well known airline. However to cover such rotations for just one day per week is not nearly so cost effective, but I'm not saying that it doesn't happen.

Don't forget that minimum hours rest between shifts also needs to be taken into account, especially for crews where lengthy turns are involved. This can very easily have a major impact on their rostered availability for working days either side of a rostered long day. For example; a crew on late shift the previous day being able to catch a long shift and likewise a crew on early turns working a long shift and being able to catch an early turn the following day. The same scenario can still apply if the turn can be accommodated using just one set of crew starting and finishing their turn at Gatwick or any other base; for example GTW-EXT, EXT-TFS-EXT and EXT-GTW. As for using rest days as a means of accommodating minimum hours between shifts - let’s not even get started on that one....

My own view is that EXT-TFS for this summer will be resourced by an aircraft and crew based in the Canary Islands or elsewhere in Europe. No doubt there is a game plan which we are not party too....

 

[Flybeboy]

The alba star 738 ops to palma has been canceled for this summer. Pax booked are being offered seats on the tues, fri or sat flights or the flybe ss. This is due to tui cutting back

 

[TheLocalYokel]

The alba star 738 ops to palma has been canceled for this summer. Pax booked are being offered seats on the tues, fri or sat flights or the flybe ss. This is due to tui cutting back

Thank you for the information, Flybeboy. EXT is not the only airport that has seen TUI reductions for the coming summer as I'm sure you are aware.

 

[Severn]

Summary of TUI operations - Summer 2019

I've compared a week in August 2019 to the same week in 2018 of TUIs schedule from EXT:
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of routes operating per week:
2018: 12
2019: 14 (+2)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of flights per week:
2018: 18
2019: 20 (+2)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of aircraft based:
2018: 1x TUI B738
2019: 1x TUI B738
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Weekly Frequencies: (a '[+]' or '[-]' represents change from 2018)

4x Weekly
Majorca (PMI)* *(2018: 1 of 4 flights operated by Albastar / 2019: All flights operated by TUI)

2x Weekly
Dalaman (DLM)* *(2018 & 2019: All flights operated by Freebird)
Lanzarote (ACE)
Menorca (MAH)

1x Weekly
Antalya (AYT) [NEW]* *(2019: Flight operated by Freebird)
Corfu (CFU)
Crete Heraklion (HER) [NEW]
Faro (FAO)* *(2019: Flight operated by CWL based TUI B738 operating CWL-FAO-EXT-FAO-CWL)
Ibiza (IBZ)
Larnaca (LCA)
Paphos (PFO)
Rhodes (RHO)
Tenerife (TFS)* *(2018: Flight operated by TUI / 2019: Flight operated by Norwegian)
Zante (ZTH) [NEW]

Dropped
Gran Canaria (LPA) - (operated by TUI 1x weekly in 2018)

SUMMARY
EXT based TUI B738 operates 15x flights per week
CWL based TUI B738 operates 1x flight per week
Norwegian B738 operates 1x flight per week
Freebird A320 operates 3x flights per week

 

[Severn]

The alba star 738 ops to palma has been canceled for this summer. Pax booked are being offered seats on the tues, fri or sat flights or the flybe ss. This is due to tui cutting back

As you can see from above, TUI are not cutting back from EXT, and will still operate to PMI 4x weekly in 2019 as they did in 2018.
The Thursday flight to PMI which was operated by an Albastar in 2018 will be operated by a based TUI aircraft in 2019.

 

[737 400]

And don't forget that the Monday rotation to Gran Canaria is only cancelled for the summer months only, due to lack of available resources. The EXT based TUI B737 operates one of their new routes from EXT to Zante, leaving the EXT-LPA rotation now uncovered due to Norweigen now being unable to cover that rotation, having since decided to close their base at LPA.

 

[Flybeboy]

Tui have cut more flights from exeter, now the antalaya flights ops by freebird will only op in july and aug only. The hurgada egypt flights in winter are no longer bookable

 

[Severn]

Tui have cut more flights from exeter, now the antalaya flights ops by freebird will only op in july and aug only. The hurgada egypt flights in winter are no longer bookable

See the Thomson Airways/TUI thread in the Exeter section. I posted on the 3rd of March a comparison of this summer to last, it's post #52.
I'm sure this will be moved into that thread, however in summary, August 2019 will see TUI operate 1x extra departure a week using their own metal, and 1x extra departure per week using another airline versus last year.
2018 weekly departures in August: 15x TUI / 2x Freebird /1x Albastar
2019 weekly departures in August: 16x TUI / 3x Freebird /1x Norwegian

The peak season may see more flights than last year, but maybe the months either side of peak season will see a drop. This could be lack of aircraft or staff, or TUI choosing not to put too much capacity at lower fares outside of the school holidays.

 

[Flybeboy]

Exeter tui 2020. Looks like the same again from tui in 2020. The tenerife flight is still showing ops norweigan, disbite them shutting down their base their. Zakinthos\ zante the same place and herakilon crete are back but cant find antalaya turkey it was cut to july \ aug this year. Also the las palmas flight is only oct. But the faro flight is down as 06.05 dep from exeter but its still down as a W pattern from cardiff. So no new routes yet from tui.

 

[737 400]

Email received from TUI today advising that our Tuesday flight from EXT to HER this summer has been retimed from 14.05 hrs to 15.15 hrs and likewise the return flight is retimed to depart Heraklion later at 22.20 hrs.
I've checked the TUI website, however the morning rotation to Mallorca looks to be unaltered.

Anybody 'in the know' able to give a reason for retiming of the Heraklion rotation?

 

[ROC10]

Email received from TUI today advising that our Tuesday flight from EXT to HER this summer has been retimed from 14.05 hrs to 15.15 hrs and likewise the return flight is retimed to depart Heraklion later at 22.20 hrs.
I've checked the TUI website, however the morning rotation to Mallorca looks to be unaltered.

Anybody 'in the know' able to give a reason for retiming of the Heraklion rotation?

I’m not “in the know” but perhaps it’s an issue on the HER side rather than with TOM. Possibly HER is very busy at the original time etc.

 

[737 400]

I’m not “in the know” but perhaps it’s an issue on the HER side rather than with TOM. Possibly HER is very busy at the original time etc.

Could well be.