Cheeky Visual,
You choose to mention Ryanair, OK I'm going back a few years when I worked with contracting flight crew to Ryanair and Ryanair do/did have crews all over Europe except that such is the Ryanair way of doing things these crew weren't positioned and/or hotac'd in these locations.
Ryanair had designated that some crew members, at the drop of a hat, were deemed to have a floating base and any positioning was performed in the crew member's own time when he/she was off duty and no hotac was provided because the crew member was deemed to be at his/her base for that day, that week, or whatever.
And around the same time I was hearing that the EZY crews were revolting because there was so much positioning and hotac going on.
So positioning and hotac does fit in with the low cost model and, in the case of "W" pattern Med's, Canary's or wherever the cost of hotac'ing and per-diem'ing five crew members for an overnight would make a price difference of less than GBP1 per passenger ticket over the four sectors operated.
But BMI Baby and Thomsonfly jumped on the low-cost bandwagon long after the horse had bolted so they were only going to get the dregs that the mainstream Loco's weren't interested in and, unfortunately, CWL was one such dreg.
The point I was making was that a UK LoCo could equally serve those Spanish destinations that Vueling is serving by "W" patterning flights in to CWL, crew transport to/from BRS is only 1.5 hours or BHX 2.5 hours, I wasn't having a go at you, I was merely pointing out that this isn't rocket science.
Right, Tropical Depression AGATON seems to have eased so I might actually get some work done today ... See ya
Last edited by Phileas Fogg; 20th Jan 2014 at 00:41.