Deal for Thomsonfly to switch to Birmingham Airport raised at Coventry inquiry

[LTNman]

The following is an article from http://www.uk-airport-news.info/birmingham-airport-news-180206.htm. So is Coventry about to loose Thomsonfly?


Bosses of Thomsonfly and Birmingham Airport almost struck an amazing business deal - at the planning enquiry into Coventry Airport's expansion! Thinly veiled negotiations took place as Thomsonfly consultant and Coventry Airport executive chairman Bill Savage took the stand for the first time yesterday at the planning inquiry into the application for a new terminal at Coventry airport.

Mr Savage, who also works as a consultant for no-frills airline Thomsonfly, was being cross examined by BIA representative, John Steele QC, at Leamington Town Hall. He told the hearing Coventry Airport charges Thomsonfly £5 per customer to use Baginton, compared to charges of between £20 and £23 at Birmingham.

This cost per passenger was denied by Mr Steele, who said the low-cost airline would only be charged between £5 and £6 per passenger if the operations moved from Coventry to Birmingham.
With negotiations under way, the two parties then began discussing whether the deal would be extended to present routes operating out of Birmingham.


Mr Savage said: 'If that were the case I would be fairly sure TUI would be pretty excited by that offer!' But as discussions began in earnest before a deal could be struck, government inspector Neil Roberts stopped them. He said: 'I am beginning to think this should be taking place somewhere else. Probably behind closed doors.'

In between discussions, relations between the two parties had remained frosty. Birmingham Airport bosses are concerned that increased operations at Coventry could impact on availability of airspace. Meanwhile, Coventry Airport bosses claimed they were frozen out of negotiations over the availability of air space in the region. The availability of airspace is likely to be a key factor in the out-come of the inquiry, which is due to continue until late May or June this year.

[SeamusCVT]

Yes, CVT could quite possibly lose Thomsonfly, just as any other airport might lose a carrier. However, Thomsonfly have said many times that they are committed to Coventry.

I feel the main point about the aforementioned article should be though that Birmingham International Airport's main reason to object to the expansion of Coventry has now become apparent: purely commercial, and nothing to do with safety.

In the local Coventry press on Friday, one or two very interesting points, if correct, certainly came to the fore.

However, if Thomsonfly were to leave CVT, then I am sure that the new owners will have a ready made replacement...afer all, we know that before the sale to CAFCOHL was announced to the press, the company had already been in touch with several airlines.

At the moment, one can only speculate, there could be many possibilities: Easyjet have offered a come and get us plea to the two West Midlands airports, might XXXXXXXX.XXX make a first non northern base, thereby expanding their horizons, coul one low cost carier move the other way if Thomsonfly was to go to Birmingham, or could it be that Thomsonfly might just stay?

The next few weeks could be an interesting time for all parties concerned.

[banewboi]

as far as i know tui own cvt and therefore wouldn't it be unlikely that they pull out? although i have heard on the old grapevine that they are dissatisfied with the base after they've seen such success and positive press from their originally low cost operating bases dsa and boh?

[Arbottle]

as far as i know tui own cvt and therefore wouldn't it be unlikely that they pull out? although i have heard on the old grapevine that they are dissatisfied with the base after they've seen such success and positive press from their originally low cost operating bases dsa and boh?

TUI sold Coventry Airport a few months back.

[SeamusCVT]

Well, looking at the comparative loads for the three airports over the past 4 months, I would be a lot happier with Coventry over Bournemouth and Doncaster.

I must also stress that Coventry is their original low cost base, Thomsonfly started operations from CVT on 31 March 2004, BOH started on 22 March 2005, and DSA started on 28 April 2005

As for positive press from Doncaster, I have heard many complain about the operations from there: complaints of constant delays

[banewboi]

well having been to both, and experienced loads from both, interacted with the crew from both cvt and dsa i would much rather experience dsa.

facilities, journey, aircraft are all better, and it seems that now tfly have other bases they are thining down the flight program at cvt and extending it everywhere else. as for loads they may be low but dsa is getting more well known by the day, 2 operators are taking long haul out of dsa after may 1st, ryanair are basing 3 aircraft there, tcx, fr and mon are all doing inbound w patterns and richard branson owns 3 of the hangers, the site is huge and public support is massive.

[SeamusCVT]

I'm by no means doubting the facilities at Doncaster Sheffield compared to Coventry: Doncaster Sheffield is the UKs newest airport, Coventry is a Portakabin.

Public support for Coventry is also massive: 1.4 million people using the Portakabin airport within the first 2 years of operation would certainly suggest to me that people want to use it.

You mention aircraft being better, this has nothing to do with the airport but rather where the airline positions them. In fact on December 18th 2005 I flew from Lyon to Coventry on G-THOI, an aircraft that then stayed at Coventry to do it's next rotation, CVT - ALC - CVT. As I am sure you are aware, OI is a Doncaster based aircraft, however I know that over the course of the Winter G-THOA, OB, OC and OD (OD served DSA - ALC - DSA on Friday 17th February for example) have all been used for flights originating from DSA, just as G-THOE, and OF have been used for CVT flights despite being original BOH based aircraft.

My previous posting was a response to your comment about the company being dissatisfied with Coventry. The only way that Thomsonfly would be dissatisfied would be if the load factors were poor. If they would be dissatisfied with Coventry for this reason, then they will also be dissatisfied with the two other bases.

[phil_2405]

dsa is getting more well known by the day, 2 operators are taking long haul out of dsa after may 1st, ryanair are basing 3 aircraft there,

RYR basing 3 aircraft at DSA! Since when?!

[banewboi]

they recruited for 80 positions at dsa late last year through the airports job centre.

[airhumberside]

2 operators are taking long haul out of dsa after may 1st,
Only one - TOM

tcx, fr and mon are all doing inbound w patterns
MON aren't

[coasting]

"they recruited for 80 positions at dsa late last year through the airports job centre."
They recruit all over the country but they don't open bases everywhere....

[banewboi]

servisair have been told to expect another operater for long haul and are being trained on their long haul dispatch procedures and a mon employee has said they are expecting w patterns

[banewboi]

the people that fr recruited were interviewed as dsa based crew, i don't know any of the succesful candidates but they were told it would be dsa based after interviews.

[banewboi]

I'm by no means doubting the facilities at Doncaster Sheffield compared to Coventry: Doncaster Sheffield is the UKs newest airport, Coventry is a Portakabin.

Public support for Coventry is also massive: 1.4 million people using the Portakabin airport within the first 2 years of operation would certainly suggest to me that people want to use it.

You mention aircraft being better, this has nothing to do with the airport but rather where the airline positions them. In fact on December 18th 2005 I flew from Lyon to Coventry on G-THOI, an aircraft that then stayed at Coventry to do it's next rotation, CVT - ALC - CVT. As I am sure you are aware, OI is a Doncaster based aircraft, however I know that over the course of the Winter G-THOA, OB, OC and OD (OD served DSA - ALC - DSA on Friday 17th February for example) have all been used for flights originating from DSA, just as G-THOE, and OF have been used for CVT flights despite being original BOH based aircraft.

My previous posting was a response to your comment about the company being dissatisfied with Coventry. The only way that Thomsonfly would be dissatisfied would be if the load factors were poor. If they would be dissatisfied with Coventry for this reason, then they will also be dissatisfied with the two other bases.

i believe that they have sold the facility because of the amount of trouble it has been over planning and setup etc, tui's image at the moment seems to be the point of least resistance and i think cvt has just been too much work, if bhx are offering a real discount to tom pax then if they no longer have a controlling interest in the airport they would benefit more financially from moving operations to bhx.

the crew are being treated increasiingly harshly by the company andafter such benefit are rolled out to other bases i think alot of the crew are understandably disheartened the cap371 situation is alleviated at boh and dsa because of the volume of charter flights and cvt are working like horses, i honestly believe that tfly are trying to get out.

[cvt person]

Go back to the orginal post which is based on an exchange at the public inquiry. Its the managing director of Coventry Airport trying to embarass the Qc representing Birmingham airport by getting him to commit to a 75% reduction in Thomsonfly's fees for their existing operation at Birmingham, no doubt followed by all the other airlines saying me to. In a nutshell its why Birmingham is resisting development at Coventry as it fears the airlines using Coventry as a bargaining chip to drive down their costs at Birmingham.

[SeamusCVT]

TUI sold the airport lease due to the fact that a company who knows how to properly run an airport came in and offered a hell of a lot more money than what TUI originally paid for it.

TUI only purchased the lease in November 2003 to start up Thomsonfly, they never wanted to purchase the airport but found it would be easier to.

You refer to the, Quote, "volume of charter flights" at BOH. I am only aware of full plane charter flights to ACE and the Saturday LYS charter flight currently operating. That hardly constitutes the use of the word "volume". To my knowledge, DSA at present also has only PFO, MIR, the Saturday LYS and GVA (rotated with TRN) as full plane charters. I do stand to be corrected on the latter point though.

The one thing that riles me about the cross examination of Mr Savage, is that Mr Savage was called to be examined on the basis of his association with Coventry Aiport, not his links with Thomsonfly. Birmingham Airport are after all objecting to the impact that Coventry Airport might have, not the impact of the Airline. i.e. If Easyjet or Ryanair were the operator out of Coventry, would Mr Steele QC have called Stelios or Michael O'Leary to be cross examined?

[jabird]

The fact that the CET have only picked up on this one "exchange" so far shows that the rest of it must have been pretty tedious stuff, and of course, the above mentioned lawyers are laughing all the way to the bank. At least we are at last seeing the full nature of the sour grapes and commercial drive of BHX management. Let's not forget that BHX could have picked up the airport lease in 1993 for much less than the amount CAFCO_C paid earlier this year, and probably also still less than what TUI paid for it.

"Coventry has the potential to offer SIGNIFICANT ADVANTAGE over Birmingham for general aviation, cost conscious leisure operators, parcels and pure freight operations." - in the then BHX manager's own words.

I'm not sure if this has come out in the inquiry yet, but recent suggestions of deals between CVT and BHX are nothing new.

Seamus, as a point of reference, Alex Hunter, who is "CCO" of Thomsonfly DID appear at the first inquiry, particularly to highlight the huge losses that TUI was incurring due to the stance being taken by WDC.

As this inquiry is about a permanent building, whose lifespan should be longer than any of the negotiations or contracts which might be agreed in terms of its usage, the appearance of any one airline would be much less relevant.

According to the schedule at:

http://www.warwickdc.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyres/6A4E2340-9921-4FF2-BCCD-10800CCDDFA9/0/Programme080206.pdf

Richard Heard from BHX is appearing on Thursday. This should make good viewing. A certain P Claisse of the infamous "facts" website is also due on 21st March. As far as the current situation goes, having just flown back into CVT earlier this evening, I am firmly of the belief that the sooner the permanent terminal is built, the better. The staff at CVT have to be amongst the friendliest of any UK airport - from parking attendants to check in and back through to the immigration officials. But they are working in terrible facilities which are just not suitable for attracting other operators - where else do you sit on the stand for 10 minutes "whilst we clear the terminal of passengers"?

[SeamusCVT]

Could not agree more about the need for the new terminal, and also about your point for Birmingham International Airport's true objections to the expansion of Coventry Airport.

It does not take a genious to read through the lines of the reported exchange last week: heck if I can read through the lines, then I cannot wait to see the Government officials tear Birmingham's objections to shreds.

Just as a sideline, I must add though that Alex Hunter is no longer affiliated with Thomsonfly, his role has now been taken on by Guy Stephenson.

[SeamusCVT]

To the administrators of PPRune, I apologise for the reference to a company that you feel has had to be blanked out on my first post in this thread. Any reference was done purely on the basis of providing information, or possible alternatives in the context of this thread.

I in no way intended to use the name of the company as a source of advertising.