Originally Posted by
ShotOne
In which case why don’t they fly under their own branding so passengers can make an informed choice? I’ve nothing against Smartlynx as such, but holiday-makers are being conned that they are flying on a Thomas Cook aircraft
It is because your average holiday maker knows that an aeroplane flies from one point of the earth to another (see note 1). Above that he/she largely has little interest in the flight other than the cabin experience. Almost all TC ACMI aircraft are branded as TC, have TC in-flight product and TC Cabin Crew. They have bought a TC 'product' and they have received it. On the TC website, if a holiday/flight is being flown with a non MT flight number, it will say operated by xxx airlines. In fact they go further, in the bowels of the website there is even a page which describes who is operating the ACMI a/c. All the info is there, but few customers will go looking for it, but they will always look at the price.
Note 1. It is not uncommon for passengers not to actually know where on the planet they are actually bound for!