Mooncrest:
The direct costs of travel and hotac were considerable, but there was also the indirect cost of using duty days to travel instead of flying on revenue services. I don't have figures, but I suspect the last point may have been the biggest cost. The objective of the revised crew basing plan in the 90s was to eliminate all those costs and wasted duties - to a large extent it did. Part of the intention was also to end W-pattern trips, but that was not wholly achieved, not least because the spread of business over the country was in a constant state of flux. And still is, even without Covid.