January 21, 2022

More articles from the category

January 21, 2022

With Condor and Sky Express to 28 destinations in Greece

From summer, the holiday airline will be offering 17 non-stop connections to Greece. Together with Sky Express, Condor now offers easy onward flights to eleven additional destinations. The new partnership will also increase connections to existing destinations. From July 2022, travelers will be able to travel on to the eleven new destinations via Athens, Rhodes, Corfu and Heraklion, including destinations such as Naxos, Paros and Mytilini. From Germany, the planes will take off from Berlin, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich and Leipzig. "Together with Sky Express, Condor offers its passengers an uncomplicated onward journey to the most beautiful destinations in Greece, thus enabling flexible travel planning," says Ralf Teckentrup, CEO of Condor. "We are not only expanding our route network, but also offering guests the opportunity to discover the diversity of the country for themselves.

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ANA: Corporate partners can now fly more closely

The airline is now expanding its offering to include business trips for its corporate partners as part of the "SAF Flight Initiative". The program, which was launched in October 2021, aims to increase the proportion of sustainable aviation fuels and thus reduce emissions associated with business travel. The program was originally developed only for the cargo sector. "Since the launch of the 'SAF Flight Initiative' for the cargo sector in October last year, the response both in Japan and abroad has been much greater than we expected. Given the urgent need to do something about climate change, I believe that environmental awareness in the corporate world will increase even further in the future," said Shinichi Inoue, Executive Vice President of Sales & Marketing. "Let us work together to create a sustainable society and pass on the blue skies to the next generation."

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American Airlines can recover losses

The new Omicron variant brings new challenges for airlines. Nevertheless, the US airline manages to significantly reduce its losses. In the three months to the end of December, the bottom line was $931 million (equivalent to just under 821 million euros), as the aviation portal Aero reports. Sales in the final quarter increased by over 130 percent to $9,4 billion compared to the same period last year. The figures were better than expected. A year ago, burdens from the pandemic had put the company in the red with $2,2 billion. In the first Corona year of 2020, the loss was still $8,9 billion.

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From February: Thailand makes entry easier again

The quarantine-free "Test & Go" model will be resumed on February 1st after it was suspended at the end of December. Fully vaccinated tourists must present a negative test result upon entry, take a paid PCR test after arriving in Thailand and then wait one night in the hotel for the result. This version of the regulation also applied last year. What is new, however, is a second PCR test on the fifth day of the stay. This is reported by the travel portal Reisevor9. A tracking app must also be downloaded to track whereabouts.

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Hahn: ECJ dismisses Lufthansa lawsuit for subsidies

Lufthansa suffered a defeat before the European Court of Justice in the matter of state aid granted to Frankfurt-Hahn Airport. The judges definitively dismissed a lawsuit against subsidies from the state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The matter has been dragging on for several years, as it concerned, for example, a credit line that Rhineland-Palatinate had granted to the regional airport. Lufthansa saw this as a distortion of competition and took the case to court. It had already suffered a defeat before the Court of Justice of the European Union, but made use of the legal remedy of appealing to the ECJ. The Supreme Court agreed with the decision of the lower court and found that Lufthansa had no right to sue in this matter because it never regularly flew to Hahn Airport. The legal dispute has now been concluded in the final instance and the European Court of Justice ruled that the crane company must reimburse both the EU Commission and the state of Rhineland-Palatinate for the legal costs. In the past, Lufthansa has repeatedly taken legal action against subsidies granted by the public sector to regional airports. One of the views is that this could indirectly subsidise the services of competitor Ryanair. However, the ECJ did not go into this issue in more detail because, in the court's view, there was insufficient evidence that there had been a significant reduction in market share and, in addition, the ECJ denied the right to bring an action in this matter.

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Mallorca: Fincas were in high demand last year

Fincallorca, a company specializing in the brokerage of fincas on the Spanish island of Mallorca, announced that it was able to broker significantly more accommodation last year than in 2019. According to the provider, the proportion of travelers who booked at short notice has quadrupled compared to pre-crisis levels. Despite the lockdown and constantly changing travel regulations, this led to almost 11.000 bookings. This meant a very important source of income for the owners of the fincas, mostly Mallorcans, in a destination that is so heavily dependent on tourism. Around 16 percent of customers are said to have made use of the free cancellation offered. According to Fincallorca, 75 percent of this capacity was able to be re-booked. The broker says it has already received around 5.000 bookings for the current year. It is therefore expected that fincas on Mallorca will be in high demand again this year.

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Survey: 83 percent of Austrians want to go on vacation this year

A recent survey has shown that around 83 percent of Austrians are planning a vacation this year. Compared to last year, the willingness to do so has increased by five percentage points. Around two thirds want to travel abroad. The analysis carried out by Corps Touristique also showed that Italy, Croatia and Germany are particularly popular destinations. During a press conference, the organization also explained that the surveys had shown that there is a strong pandemic fatigue. An interesting picture is also presented by looking at the reasons given by those who want to stay at home. 41 percent said that they are worried about Corona or are not confident about further developments. At least 15 percent of those surveyed said that they cannot afford a vacation this year. However, many did not want to reveal the reasons. They were also asked about the means of transport they used to get there. The popularity of their own car increased again. Even fewer people than last year said that they wanted to fly on vacation by plane. The destinations Italy, Croatia, Germany, Greece and Spain were mentioned most frequently as planned holiday destinations.

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Germany: Condor is looking for 150 new flight attendants

The German holiday airline Condor is looking for around 150 flight attendants to fly from Frankfurt, Düsseldorf, Munich, Hamburg and Leipzig. They are to be deployed on the Boeing 757, B767, Airbus A320, A321 and, from autumn 2022, also on the A330neo. Condor will initially employ the new cabin crew, who will be employed full-time, on fixed-term two-year contracts. Part-time flight attendants will be given permanent contracts. Condor has been hiring 180 new pilots since November and is also taking on the Condor pilots it has trained itself. The carrier is thus preparing for the new long-haul aircraft, the Airbus A330neo. Condor is the German launch customer for this model.

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Deutsche Bahn is turning Rail & Fly inside out

For some tour operators it is included, for others an additional charge must be paid, but there is now a fundamental change in the Rail & Fly offer from Deutsche Bahn AG. In future, there will no longer be a voucher in the travel documents, but instead a code. DB began the changeover in November 2021, but the change only came into effect a few days ago in GDS systems used by travel agencies. Until now, it was usual for a voucher to be handed over on paper or as a PDF. What is new is that a code is issued with which the tickets can be obtained via the DB homepage. For example, this can be printed on the operator's booking confirmation. For passengers, however, there is now a major change: With the voucher, you could simply board a train and show it at a ticket inspection. The train attendant then printed out a ticket. What is new is that the code no longer entitles you to board DB trains, but an online ticket must be "purchased" in advance. According to a spokeswoman for Deutsche Bahn, you now have to go through the regular booking process for a normal ticket purchase and then enter the code received from the operator, airline or travel agency as a means of payment. An online ticket is then issued. DB emphasizes that the timetable is now also printed on the ticket, so that travelers no longer have to worry about their travel plans themselves. However, the change also has disadvantages. As already mentioned: You can no longer simply board any train and then receive a ticket for a fee.

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CO2 certificates: Air Berlin insolvency administrator loses before the ECJ

Air Berlin insolvency administrator Lucas Flöther suffered a setback in the matter of carbon dioxide emission certificates before the European Court of Justice. The lawyer went to court on behalf of the masses to sue for the allocation of free certificates that had been stopped after the insolvency. The case was referred to the European Court of Justice by the Berlin Administrative Court for a preliminary ruling. The court rejected the request from the former airline's insolvency estate. The background to the lawsuit is that Air Berlin had been allocated free emission certificates for the period from 2012 to 2020. These are tradable and some were also sold. However, the German authorities stopped issuing certificates to Air Berlin after the insolvency and cessation of flight operations. However, these are certainly valuable and could have been sold for the benefit of the creditors. In addition, Air Berlin did this and those that were promised for 2018 had already been sold before August 2017. But they were not received. Therefore, insolvency administrator Flöther initially took the case to the Berlin Administrative Court. The court referred the case to the European Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling. The ruling was against Air Berlin, so the German court will most likely accept the ruling.

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