Oh dear Sean Dillon. Seems you are now so bitter and twisted about your employer that you are finding it difficult to type legible sentances. Time to let it go dear chap.

Whatever the legal rights and wrongs, Jet2's trenchant attitude to EU261 claims runs the risk of it being classed in the Ryanair category of customer service. And with even Ryanair trying to improve its image, that's not a good place to be.

Time to wake up and smell the coffee.

Jet2
 

Big, do try not to be patronising. The gist of Sean's remarks are clear.

Seriously, what type of volatile society do we live in today - a one that wherever there's a blame, there's a claim!

What more do people want? So you're delayed - it happens. The airline forks out the cost for everyone to eat, communicate, and sleep. People receive this, and then try to put a claim in!!??? :ugh:

It's simply ridiculous, especially given that the more people who put in a claim, the more money the airline has to pay out. The knock-on effect is that fares become higher, and with this, people complain about having to pay more for their ticket!!! :ugh: (Either that, or crew wages start to shrink - Yikes, bad news Sean Dillon, if you don't like where you work, why are you still there??? - Think it's time to take Big Tudor's advice [#2298])

And with all of this, they are complaining about time limits to put in a claim. 2 years is a more than adequate time period in which to claim for a delayed flight. The reality is, the vast majority of people will have forgotten about it a few weeks later (of course until they are told they cold claim £££)!!!

Ivan aromer - The gist of Mr Dillons comments is crystal clear, indeed this is one of the tamer offerings. However I do find the desire to be so damning about ones employer on a public website curious to say the least. Sean has delighted in telling us of the many pilots who have left Jet2 in recent months, yet seems happy to wave them farewell whilst continuing to take the company shilling. You'll have to forgive me if I find these double standards a trifle hypocritical, and take a rather dubious view of this individuals comments.

I think if there is anything amiss here, it's the CAA's morally reprehensible actions in launching this press release on a Saturday. Clearly designed to be picked up by all of the Sunday papers and to minimise the opportunity for the airlines getting a Haynes Handbagging to be able to respond in any meaningful way. Disgraceful way for a regulator to behave, but not unsurprising given the leadership style prevailing.

The need for a big 'like' button on pprune.... I think you have hit the nail, bang in the centre of the head Big Tudor.

Let's hope for Sean's sake that none of his bosses have any knowledge of this public website. But then of course if they did, and handed him his P45, he'd probably be happy to leave, right? So then why does he not leave on his own account??? :confused:

A like button would be of great use for Flightrider's comment:

You're right, it is an absolute degradation of a national regulator. Do the CAA just want to see LCC's out of business? (Let that be the Mirror, and their ridiculous reports)

You having a laugh? CAA picking on the poor rule-breaking LCC??

I'm sure the CAA just want LCC's to follow the rules and not to pick and chose which one's they like.

That's not the way the world works and a bit rich to cry foul when you get caught out.

Yes, that's right SWBKCB. Although many of us might agree that the rules are harsh, Jet2 have exhausted all of the legal appeal processes and they now have to comply with the law. That includes a six-year limit on claims.

You can't blame CAA for seeking to ensure that all airlines now comply with the law.

Jet2 mustn't get a reputation for being recalcitrant - once you get such a reputation it's really difficult to shake it off, as Ryanair know only too well.

I suppose if you choose to operate ancient aircraft then you must be prepared for the downside which is the numerious delays that afflict jet 2 ..you cannot have it all ways

Exactly Basil.

These laws were made to be complied with by all airlines and Jet2 should by now have realised that includes them.

Irrespective of the personal views of people on this thread, the CAA are acting correctly in ensuring compliance.

Jet2_738 talks out of his bottom again
 

Jet2_738 the CAA are not targeting low cost airlines or Jet2 their compliance action also targeted Aer-Lingus who are a scheduled carrier.

The enforcement action against Jet2 is because Jet2 have NOT complied with the rules, simples......whether you or Jet2 agree with the law is not relevant.

Jet2 go to considerable lengths to ensure they can recover from delays including aircraft and crews on standby in Spain and that is commendable.

They have the added problem that as an IT operator the responsibilities and costs when things go wrong is far higher than a pure LoCo operator that is not ATOL

They are operate at the bottom end of the market (buckets & spades) and that social group are far more likely to jump on the 'claims' band wagon, something for nothing to compensate that their £280 all in weeks holiday was wrecked by a delay of 3 hours.

Spotitiludrop is also correct, if you choose to operate aircraft that are anywhere between 3 -6 times older than your peer group average you are going to get more tech problems and delays, its the other side of the savings coin on new aircraft.

Jet2 will/have attracted a lot more claims by the publicity surrounding their refusal to pay up.

If you read Flightrider's comment in full, you'll realise that the idea is of them publishing such information on a Saturday, or in other words, gold dust for the Sunday papers, who have nothing else to complain about. Jet2 are not BA, and will never be. Their business will take more of a hit (over the weekend) than that of a national carrier (like Aer Lingus) will. That is where the LCC comment came from.

Jet2 are gradually renewing their fleet - Seriously, haven't we heard the argument about aircraft age the world over? Jet2, as I'm sure you will know, keep their aircraft in tip-top shape whether they're 13 or going on 30. Just because FR have a fleet of newer aircraft, does not make them much less immune to tech problems. The older aircraft 733's are all owned outright, quite the flip side of FR ops, where few are actually owned by them. The 733's are starting to be phased out, and replacing them, are the 738's (the same type of aircraft that FR operate). Jet2 are a relatively young airline. Just remember how EZY started out - with old, second-hand aircraft, and then struck a deal with Airbus, and well, you know the story. LS are almost half the age of EZY - give them a chance. As for: I mean - Really??:ugh:

Come on Jet2_738 Jet2 are not a young airline, just how long have Channex been around?

Whether they keep them in top condition or not does not eliminate 'aged' problems its as simple as that. J2 engineers do a great job, but drive a long any motorway for a year and yes you'll see the odd S class or Range rover stranded on the hard shoulder but overwhelmingly it is older vehicles, my point is simply this that Jet2/Channex historically have made a business decision to buy aged aircraft because they are less expensive to acquire and it suits their very seasonal business plan. I have no problem with that at all, but you have to expect and plan for higher maintenance costs, again J2 do that, what has changed is consumer legislation has ruled that airline can no longer use unexpected technical problems to doge paying compensation and that applies equally to new aircraft.

To my knowledge J2 does not publish delay information or its despatch rate.

I know everyone loves a good conspiracy theory, but seriously does anyone believe that the CAA publishes on a Saturday just to get at Jet 2 in particular?

I am sorry but that really is carrying things too far.

There really is some rubbish written on here. Its a shame as some good hard facts also emerge.

I will declare my hand first.
i am a shareholder and have owned up to 2% of the group in the past.
PM has a 40% stake in this business and whilst clearly not perfect it must be said that his team have done a great job in building this company.
We have had growth of 100% a year for 4 years in the holiday division.
Shareholders have seen big gains in the price of their stock.

It is not right that employees should have a pop at the company from behind a plastic name on here.
Sean if you have done 35 years you are early/mid 50`s so Man up and go have it out.
You are paid about 100k a year for a 400 hr contract ( if you are full time) and nearly always get back to base.
Older aircraft do not mean more breakdowns. Having no backup creates the issue.
I left MAN on a MON flight due out 6.30 am at 10.30 pm a few years ago after it was decided to bump morning and pm flight on the 330.
So it happens...........even BA on new aircraft.
JET 2 do there best..........a few years ago out of Leeds a JET2 plane had gone tech in spain within 3 hours we were on a hired in 757 that had to return to Leeds after a possible fire on t/o.
result an overnight delay.it happens.
Flew last week to GV and back to LBA 757 out and an old 737 back.
both on time ( early actually) and great service.
Flight back had 2 captains and a fo in cockpit out and in ( any idea why guys).
New planes have a huge depreciation charge that you cannot cover by flying 2 sectors a day. they need to work.
The business model has always been ,good quality planes that are lower to fly than new.

and if they followed the rules, there wouldn't be anything to publish.

I feel that the compensation rules are too generous at this end of the market. Maybe capping it within the EU rules at a maximum of twice the fare paid, including taxes etc, would be more reasonable? I wonder if those who created the EU rules really considered the LCC end of the market properly.

The point I was making was that the CAA press release was so clearly timed to be a name and shame exercise that it's unacceptable. You have an organisation which is renowned for its Monday to Friday 0900 to 1700 culture and the only time it has ever put out press releases on weekends is in response to a major accident or tour operator failure. By publishing a pro-active release on a Saturday to be picked up by the Sunday press, it minimises the airline's ability to respond if it has something meaningful to say by way of counter-comment.

If it has an ongoing issue with Jet2 or other operators, this is not a professional and balanced way to go about it. It is superficial, subjective regulation that is sadly in keeping with the values of its CEO.

Anothertyke is probably right to question whether the EC considered LCCs when setting the rules. But that isn't the point, which is that the rules are now clear (at least in relation to technical delays) and airlines have no option but to comply. The compensation levels are set by the directive, and cannot be varied by the CAA or any other national body. By all means lobby for a change, but in the meantime comply with the rules as they stand.

As has been pointed out by others, Jet2's notoriety in relation to EU261 claims will only encourage people to claim. It has only itself to blame for being seen as tricksy. And it will take a long time for its reputation to recover.

The CAA's full report will be published tomorrow, showing how a wider group of airlines (not just the bad boys) are complying with EU261.

Facelookbovvered:

If any other airline publishes their delay information perhaps you would let us know.

In the meantime here are some CAA published statistics on complaints on cancelled and delayed flights for four airlines that have ATOL cover for their flights and which are comparable in their commercial activities during the period of 1 January 2014 and 30 September 2014.

The statistics offered by the CAA, as shown below, clearly demonstrate that JET2 may have the older fleet but also have less complaints concerning delays and cancellations than any of the other comparable airlines and by an enormous margin. Taking only the complaints for delays, JET2 should be congratulated for its excellent record in comparison with the other three airlines:

CAA Statistics Period: 01JAN2014 to 30SEP2014

Entity Cancellations Delays Other Total Complaints Passengers (m) Complaints per million passengers
Jet2.Com 15 543 98 656 6.1 108.4
Monarch Airlines 35 1931 88 2054 7.0 294.1
Thomas Cook Airlines 136 4434 281 4851 6.1 799.7
Thomson Airways 74 3080 266 3420 10.1 337.4


http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/80/complai...er_airline.pdf

Remind me - what's a press release for? Another argument could be that the CAA isn't doing its duty if it doesn't attempt to reach the maximum target audience.

There is a lot of info on airline delay stats, including vast detail on the CAA website. The following link provides a more user-friendly summary.

FLIGHTONTIME.info - Scheduled Airline Delays & Punctuality in the UK

Jet2 have improved over the last few years, but they are still some way down the list.

If we look at the last 15 scheduled airlines in the FLIGHT_ON_TIME punctuality list, we find JET2 at number 27, with British Airways at number 26, Easyjet at number 22 and Ryanair at number 20. Below JET2 at number 28 is Emirates and at 29 we have Qatar Airways followed by Monarch Scheduled at number 33.

Considering the competing airlines and their brand new fleets, JET2 are doing very well to maintain their position among such strong competition.

Good to see you sticking up for Jet2.com CT, always interesting to hear your opinions on the various share bulletin boards.

I agree wholeheartedly with any criticism of employees that berate the hand that feeds them behind a supposed cloak of invisibility. If you work for Jet2.com and don't like it then please take your moaning elsewhere, perhaps apply for a job with Utopia Airlines!

With regards to 2 Captains and one FO, there could be several reasons but most likely training or an annual check. Also CT please bear in mind that there are quite a lot of us that fly significantly more than 400 hours a year and that flying hours don't equate to duty hours; I regularly work 50 hour weeks!

Finally, with regards to EU261, yes it is law and yes it should be paid but this doesn't make it right. Can you imagine being able to claim £200 if your train is delayed or cancelled, claiming £100 from the Highways Agency when a road is blocked by a breakdown or £50 from your doctor if you are seen 30 minutes late. The compensation should match the service provided, any reputable airline, Jet2.com included, will provide meal vouchers or hotel accommodation when appropriate. Is it right that someone should be able to claim three times the cost of the service when there has been no incidental loss. The whole system is far too heavily skewed to the consumer especially with regards to LCC who are working with incredibly small profit margins, trying to provide a service and keeping thousands of staff employed.

I have to agree with castleford tiger, though I personally would like to reiterate that I have no stake in Jet2, or am not in any way associated with them. I would also like to commend DjerbaDevil's comments too, and to Facelookbovvered, just take a look at the document, before making any rash or hasty judgements.

It certainly isn't, and given the way this society has and is continuing to descend into, I wouldn't be surprised when it comes out that people are taking their doctors' surgery to court after been seen 30 minutes late!...

Jet2 offered their first flight from LBA - AMS on 12th February 2003 - Thats just gone 12 years. Channex might have been around longer, but made no impact at all on the passenger market - see Dart Group History

Anyway, that said, as castleford tiger said, there has been 100% growth in the holidays part of the business, so Jet2 must be doing something right! It certainly isn't right that people hide behind websites like this, and slag off their company, and do it in such a manner, even whilst taking the company's dollar... :=

Older aircraft certainly doesn't mean more going tech. LS keep a good fleet, and although people like Sean Dillon disagree, they are the birds that give him his paycheck, and are obviously very profitable, and from my experience, certainly very smart inside too. Having been on many LS flights myself, and going on another this summer with Jet2holidays, I can say that each have been very smart (even the 28yr old 733QC's), and each have been early on arrival, including LS155 this summer, which went around at TFS, but still managed to land 7mins early. Even better on the return, I landed 32mins ahead of schedule, and even returning at 0100 in the morning, I can say that the crew who had done a full days work were very pleasant and had smiles on their faces as we disembarked. Irrespective of this, it is inevitable that any airline will get its fair share of delays, whether the aircraft has just rolled off the production line, or is going on 30.

And it has, and continues to serve them very well indeed, taking the north on holiday, and that said, their business model of not touching London (unlike any other UK IT/LCC, is a very good one, and shows that the company is staying firm to its northern routes, and so it should! :ok:

The long haul carriers you mention operate from large hubs and will often delay their own flights for connecting passengers. You need aircraft dispatch reliability figures if you wish to compare old for new, which you will be hard pressed to obtain.

Rankings
 

Much of the ranking info needs to be qualified

Smaller airlines such as Logan Air & bmi regional only operate a handful of flights mainly from airports that are not slot restricted.

Large airline such as BA & EK operate from airports such as LHR where delays are the norm and getting away a heavy on time with business pax that think they should board 10 sec before push is a challenge.

Like wise large loco such easyJet, Ryanair, Norwegian often operate from busier airports such as LGW, STN its a very different situation from LBA, EMA, NCL, BPL or even Manchester.

This debate over new -v- old is difficult to quantify, i can only go on my personal experience of operating old 737 & near new NG's (under 5 years old) and there is simply no comparison, in the past 3 years of flying NG's only i have had two use the QRH just twice, that was a weekly occurrence flying vintage 12-18 year old CL. The CL is a fine aircraft but when they get old you get snags most are quickly sorted by powering down and up again, but you pick up delays.

It was interesting to read a shareholders view (2%) is a lot !! but any pilot with hours on new or old aircraft will tell you the newer the better, B787 aside perhaps !!

From what i've read Jet2 have caught the CAA's wrath because they (Jet2) lost a court case and should have paid up, but decided to delay pending another court case in the hope of appealing should that case be found in favour of another operator.

Inconvenience is inconvenience, no matter the purchase price, it makes not a dot of difference if i miss a connecting flight because Jet2 arrive late into AMS and i have only paid £30 or i miss it because of KLM (more likely!!) and paid £300, so unless Jet2 and other LoCo's are going to argue that the risk of being late is higher and that's reflected in the price, then they should pay up, the last 3 pages on here wouldn't be nor the negative newspaper and press coverage.

So great to hear Jet2 are doing well, just pay up please:ok:

LNIDA
 

I would put LGW and MAN in the same category, both have in excess of 20 million passengers, both are ACL Level 3 co-ordinated airports.
Stansted is a doddle compared to Manchester, it may be single runway but its taxiway layout is much less likely to cause delays.
Manchester has a layout which was not designed, it evolved.
On a summers morning in Manchester it can be carnage.
It is a wonder it works as well as it does.

As an aside STN is also ACL level 3, despite it only having about 17 million passengers.

It appears that they are.

Jet2 lashes back at threat of fines unless it adheres to European compensation rules - Travel - The Independent

I don't know where Check Mags On gets his numbers for Stansted, but it actually has 20.6 million passengers. And at the present rate of growth it will probably overtake MAN again within the next year or two (though I hate to admit it...)

My apologies that was a typo. I meant to say 17 million. Which was 2013 figures. They haven't quite got the 20 million yet. Just missed it by a couple of thousand. Although as you say it is growing fast. But so is Manchester.

20.6 million at STN in the 12 months ending Feb 2015. And based on ACL data it will catch MAN up quickly in the summer...

That's the thing with statistics. They get twisted. I was talking a calendar year and you were talking rolling twelve months.
19,978,766 Stansteds own figures for the calendar year 2014.
http://www.stanstedairport.com/media/1321193/stansted_traffic_statistics_december_2014.pdf

Manchester will be much busier than Stansted in the summer because of all the IT traffic and also Ryanair for the 1st time in several years operated a large program from Stansted rather than parking aircraft up for the winter

Basil, I think it may have been you who posted on the Manchester thread that the latest ACL report shows only 2.5% more seats for MAN this summer after the slot hand-backs. Do you have the equivalent figure for STN?

The top and bottom of all this is that, up until 2012, Jet2 ran a far too lean operation with absolutely no backup in the event of things going wrong. There were regular big delays, especially with the 757's as there was no slack. Just look at the OTP statistics.

However, Jet2 have sorted their act out from that point. The OTP has improved dramatically and they now do take delays VERY seriously. For an airline operating with the most vintage fleet, to be comparable to the other lo-co's and have a better on time performance record than their nearest rival Monarch - with a much newer fleet and huge in house maintenance facility is commendable. The behind the scenes effort to pull this around has been huge, and as much as some of the bitter people on here love to slate Jet2, they are a sound airline at the present time, and it must be hugely frustrating for the staff from all departments that have worked their backsides off to try help turn things around, to constantly hear the negative complaining. The business really is booming, of course there are still flaws, but compare the company to five years ago...it has matured considerably despite what some people say on here.

The problem lies with the management. Anyone that has had anything to do with PM knows exactly what I mean. He has put the two year claim rule in place internally, as he knows that the past 6 years worth of delays could financially hurt the company. Even though it's a much slicker operation now, I commend him for his passion, but in this day in age it's not a sustainable way to run an organisation. He needs to hold his hands up and pay out. It would for sure heavily impact the next annual results, but getting your name in the papers for negative things like this is going to do that anyway.

Come on PM, for once just back down and do the right thing for everyone, and for once think of the hard working people that keep the business running each day!

Righthandrule
 

I think that is a fair assessment.

With regards to Monarch OTP they are much improved over the last two years, but yes they were a shambles, a company who thought having a crown on the tail made them royal, when in fact it should have been a joker for that is what they became.

PM may have passion but it's been said before " you can take the man out of freight but can you take the freight mentality out of the man"

I'm not sure how much money you save when the only other operator with an older fleet is Air Atlantique or the historic flight compared with new/newer aircraft but the level of back up that Jet2 now provide doesn't come cheap.

I do agree with other posters that a 2 year limit on claims is fair, provided that a) the passenger were made aware that they were entiteld to claim b) that their claims haven't been kicked into the long grass in the hope that by the time they get to the court stage it past two years.
c) anyone upto the 6 year limit who had submitted a claim but had it rejected by Jet2, but that under the new legal ruling would
have had a valid claim be paid out.

Perhaps the additional profit being earned on the much lower oil price but not lower ticket prices can fund the rebates

Penny wise pound foolish

Absolutely right - and I don't imagine those "consumer champions" in the media will be happy with that either.

Do commercial insurance companies offer policies that could at least partially cover airlines against this rather silly piece of legislation (and the UK courts interpretation of it)?

ATNotts - if you feel this is a rather silly piece of legislation may I ask what measures you have taken to have it defeated/amended?


I repeat a post from another thread ...


What I fail to understand after reading various posts on this and other forums is that if people feel so strongly that the law is an ass why do they do little or nothing about it?

When the CAA/NEB produced their list of what were deemed to be extraordinary circumstances when compensation payment should not be paid I understand the EU received representation regarding issuing the list (not confirmed whether these representations were for or against but I believe the vast majority were against) from 22 parties with private individuals being the major contributors. Ask the airline you work for if they contacted the EU in support of this list …. I bet the answer is no.

In talking to my local MEP (who did sit on the EU Transportation Committee) he confirmed that I was the only person who had ever contacted him regarding 261/2004. How many of you (whether in agreement or not) have contacted your MP, your MEP, the UK representatives on the EU Transportation Committee, The EU itself or indeed the EU Ombudsman (who happens to be a lady!) ?

Any representation (which I can assure you is very limited) the airlines make is generally through the CAA however our NEB is, in effect, funded by the airline industry so you can understand why the EU have some difficulty with this.

There is an election coming up in the UK soon…. Some of you might vote, others not however there is no point in complaining about how the country is run if you don’t vote. Likewise there is no point in arguing with the odd poster on this or other forums if you believe that 261/2004 is flawed, you would be better spending your time taking the matter up with the people who matter.


Scratchingthesky - Jet2's own figures (basically hidden in their Year End report) indicate an additional 50p per passenger per flight. I believe an extra £4 per family per holiday is not a lot to pay for 'insurance' if your flight is delayed by over 3 hours. EU estimated figures actually are actually slightly higher than this but they refer to everyone on a delayed flight claiming.