Originally Posted by
caaardiff
Are the E195's bought outright or have they just taken over the lease that Flybe previously had? BE's issue with the E195's was the high lease cost of them. Was this a result of poor negotiations during the lease agreement stage or are E195's just generally high on leasing costs as standard? If Stobart own them outright or have agreed much lower leasing costs with the leasing company, given that many more newer similar sized aircraft are now available. Could flybe lease them once again from Stobart, but at a more economical price? I'm sure Flybe could make a couple of E195's work at certain airports.
I agree on a tie up with someone else. bmiRegional would be a good tie up. They can utilise the ATR fleet on shorter routes, reduce or phase out the E135/145 ageing fleet in favour of ATR's/Embraers. Potentially introduce E170/175 in order to upgauge some current BM routes that need more capacity. Run E195's alongside ATR's on the busier EI routes (If the Franchise continues)
Actually it was the E175s that Flybe had the issue with regarding cost of ownership. The problem with the E195s was the cost of operation which was why they were happy to have them parked up for a while down in NQY before finding some under-written work for them.