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-   -   Walsh gets his Vueling (https://www.pprune.org/airlines-airports-routes/513225-walsh-gets-his-vueling.html)

dav_vader 25th Apr 2013 21:44

can you confirm (or even deny) that thanks to the ib pilots "union" ib was "forced" to buy 4-engine (AB)-frames (since the guy and girls did not want to cross the atlantic on "only" 2....:ugh:)

I´m not a pilot and really I don´t know if that is completely true, but if it is, B744 was a more suitable frame for IB.

It is not a merger with BA it is that the two companies are now owned by the same holding company, which is IAG.
IB has not merged with BA no money can pass from IB to BA.
That is completely the opposite of what we hear in Spain. The CEO of Iberia always talked about a merge with BA in 50/50 conditions.
There is still a lingering misunderstanding in Spain as to how private companies work.
I´m not very agree with this. We have many private companies who are succesfull, like Zara, Ferrovial (BAA), Telefonica (o2 in uk), Repsol,...
Still now, decades after other countries, an unwillingness to accept a changed world which is not all state monopoly.
IB cannot continue as it is now and must change if it is to survive. It may well come out of this more lean, stronger, and better geared to an international market.
IAG is giving IB a chance to change and that change is needed.

Completely agree, but the way IAG is giving a chance to Iberia sounds more likely hanging up.
IAG has made a big order for new generation airframes and no one is dedicated to IB, IB is firing people where BA is growing. The slots of IB in LHR are now for the only use of BA, IB has only 50 frames when years ago was over one hundred, IB operated 1000 flights a day and now they are around 400. So, do you really think that IAG is giving a chance to IB, or perhaps they are shrinking the company in order to swallow with only one bite.

Charlie Pop 25th Apr 2013 22:12


Completely agree, but the way IAG is giving a chance to Iberia sounds more likely hanging up.
IAG has made a big order for new generation airframes and no one is dedicated to IB, IB is firing people where BA is growing. The slots of IB in LHR are now for the only use of BA, IB has only 50 frames when years ago was over one hundred, IB operated 1000 flights a day and now they are around 400. So, do you really think that IAG is giving a chance to IB, or perhaps they are shrinking the company in order to swallow with only one bite.
IAG do not dictate how Iberia is run. Iberia management dictate how Iberia is run. IAG tell Iberia management what strategic goals they need to achieve (primarily economic) and Iberia management have to implement it. It would be interesting to compare the economic targets for BA and IB given to their respective managements and see if they are different.

IB is firing people because IB is losing money and IAG will not transfer money from it's shareholders or from BA to prop up a loss-making company. If IB wants to grow it needs to make a profit, otherwise it just becomes a bottomless pit of shareholders cash.

IB slots at LHR are all used by IB. BA don't use IB slots, and have actually reduced their services to MAD in favour of Iberia, who operate an A340 to LHR now.

There is no point in having 100 airframes and operating 1000 flights per day if you do not make a profit. There seems to be a collective failure on the part of many Spanish posters here to recognise that the world has changed. They don't seem to be capable of understanding that in a nation in the grip of economic catastrophe and which has 27% unemployment that the old ways are gone. The market that propped Iberia up has collapsed, and the competition within Europe and Latin America is now cheaper than Iberia and offering a better product. Instead they prefer to blame the British "Pirates" and fabricate stories about their money being fraudulently spirited away to London. Hell I even read about one Spanish politician saying it was a disgrace that IB was being forced to cancel it's Havana flight so that BA could take the passengers instead; BA don't even fly to Havana!!

IAG don't need to swallow IB, they already own it. What they need is for Iberia to start earning it's keep. Nobody owes IB an existence. They either start to make a profit or they end up like Sabena.

dav_vader 25th Apr 2013 22:57

IB management is doing horrible, but they increase their bonus. Iberia had black figures till a couple of years ago, so as BA was having red ones. I cannot get the exactly figures but I'm quite sure I am right.

I would really like to know what are the reasons behind the IAG consolidation and the role of Antonio Vázquez. Probably is a coincidence but he was also involved in the Tabacalera-Altadis-Imperial Tobbaco merge. Another spanish firm that is finally sold to British.

Nevertheless I do agree IB has to change a lot, and make profit, but not all the responsability is on the employees. In fact many people is leaving the company, but no one of them are the executive directors who drove IB from profits to loses.

airsmiles 26th Apr 2013 05:51


IB slots at LHR are all used by IB. BA don't use IB slots, and have actually reduced their services to MAD in favour of Iberia, who operate an A340 to LHR now
That's not all true actually. BA still run multiple daily flights to Madrid, many with 767's. The early evening IB flight has been a long-haul aircraft decades. Originally with DC-8's, then DC-10's and now A340/A330's. I'm sure BA and IB both generally run the same schedule pattern and equipment types they've always done.

hunterboy 26th Apr 2013 07:22

I believe IB do one or two more flights per day to/ from LHR than before the "merger". It made a big difference to us MAD commuters, especially when BA's staff Tvl site couldn't cope with the ticketing.

dav_vader 26th Apr 2013 08:40

Besides the MAD Flights, IB used to hava a daily AGP-LHR, ALC-LHR, SVQ-LHR and many others flights that nowadays are being operated by BA, former GB airways.

172driver 26th Apr 2013 09:57


Besides the MAD Flights, IB used to hava a daily AGP-LHR, ALC-LHR, SVQ-LHR and many others flights that nowadays are being operated by BA, former GB airways.
Correct, BUT: IB stopped these flights quite some time before the "merger". Not sure if that had anything to do with being in the same (OneWorld) alliance. Btw, at least the LHR-AGP and LHR-SVQ flights were, in my very frequent experience on them, always full. Would be interesting to know why they were pulled.

Aksai Oiler 26th Apr 2013 13:57

WRONG - LHR-SVQ was gifted by IB to VY whom dropped it for an extra BIO if I remember correctly. BA picked up LHR-AGP after EasyJet bought GB Airways; the IB AGP-LHR was dropped at least 5 years ago. Today BA has dropped LHR-AGP, in favour of LGW-AGP; and I for one would love to see a flight from either SVQ, XRY or AGP to LHR; it would make my twice-a month commute to PEK a lot easier.

All I see from the likes of dav_vader are the same old excuses and blame it on the Brits; without many Brits, Germans, Dutch, Russians and Scandinavians Spain would be in an even sorrier state. IB is a basket case, to survive it needs to be reorgansed, which is what rightly or wrongly IAG are trying to do.

I don't work for BA, but I am a long suffering customer of IB, which I currently choose to avoid due to piss poor customer service

Carbon Brakes 300 26th Apr 2013 15:19

Thank You Zeb. Clearly you know Spain well. The original post has as usual turned into a wild mud slinging session, in which brits strike out at spain and its glorious aviation history when all I wanted to express was our dismay and sense of total impotence as we see a planned and fine tuned dissolution of our aeronautical control over ourselves while
our authority sits on its ass head sunk in sand.

Frank Duran 26th Apr 2013 15:28

crap crap
 
I fail to see any excuse by dar_vader, just few facts to which I can add this one : while IB was making money before the merger, BA was loosing it. Just after the merger , situation was reverted the other way around. These are facts, sheer facts.
WRONG you, damn wrong, subjective comments by a pissed traveler.

Frank Duran 26th Apr 2013 15:35

crap crap
 
My previous post was a reply to Oiler even though I use to avoid to 'feed the troll'.

Aksai Oiler 27th Apr 2013 07:18

Crap
 
Just like you I am entitled to my own opinion. I don't see any facts just conjecture from any argument which states just because a British register business has invested in Spain, that Spanish investment has been sent to the wall; all I hear are pissed off employees/former employees.

I don't see the Spanish State doing that much to get IAG to throw money away supporting IB - considering that Bankia, IAG's largest sharholder is a state owned/partially state owned enterprise. As an investor I also want to see a return on my investment, so from my point of view a re-org of IB is long overdue. Also from my point of view IB is a basket case, in more ways than one.

As for being a pissed traveller - so what? Without travellers, pissed, legless or not, Pilots, Cabin Crew and Ground Staff would have no job in the first place.

Omnipresent 27th Apr 2013 09:53

Time will tell what happens with Vueling, but in the short/medium term I would have thought that the replacement of Iberia's CEO, Rafael Sánchez-Lozano, with Luis Gallego, CEO of Iberia Express, is just as significant. IAG clearly thinks there is a lot more to do at Iberia.

Charlie Pop 27th Apr 2013 10:38


Originally Posted by Frank Duran
few facts to which I can add this one : while IB was making money before the merger, BA was loosing it. Just after the merger , situation was reverted the other way around. These are facts, sheer facts.

Are they? How do you explain Iberias €273M loss in 2009, before the merger? Looks like Iberia was well on the road to losses even before IAG existed. BA only made a loss twice between 2006 and the present day, those losses being in financial years 08/09 and 09/10, the same period in which IB made it's loss.

Ex Cargo Clown 27th Apr 2013 14:06

Always found IB crew both front and back to be professional, and friendly. The ground staff however were incompetent and lazy with a Mañana attitude.

Typical conversation; Me "This piece of freight won't fit", response "It will fit will definitely fit in an AKH, just do it", Me " Will do as you say, but you do realise the aircraft is an MD" Silence

Absolutely useless

Fairdealfrank 27th Apr 2013 17:04

27% unemployment in Spain is shocking! Spain was doing quite well out of EU membership, but threw it all away by becoming part of the eurozone area. We can argue all day about the state of Spain, and posters on this thread appear determined to do this, but eurozone membership is the cause of all its present troubles.

Of course Spain is not alone in this and the bail outs and the accompanying "austerity" cannot go on indefinitely. Spain and the others will only resolve their problems by leaving the eurozone area. Failure to do this will result in social and political unrest accross much of Europe.

It should be obvious to all that monetary union based on politics rather than converging economies is a recipe for disaster, but apparently not.

Interestingly 5 of the 6 EU "club med" countries are in deep trouble and so are their national carriers. IB is not alone: TP is up for sale, AZ is in trouble, OA is no longer with us, and CY is on its last legs.


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