EasyJet hit by wave of staff sickness as pressure grows on travel industry
EasyJet has said an unprecedented wave of staff sickness has led to flight cancellations as the UK airline industry struggles to cope with a surge in demand that the low-cost carrier expects will increase in the coming months. The airline on Tuesday said there had been a “strong and sustained” recovery since the UK government lifted all travel restrictions in late January, with leisure bookings for the summer holidays soaring ahead of 2019 levels over the past six weeks. The rapid recovery follows two bruising years and has left carriers across Europe scrambling to restore flight schedules as they struggle to meet the growing demand for flying amid chronic staff shortages, caused by cost cuts during the pandemic and a new wave of Covid-19 infections. British Airways has cancelled scores of flights, while passengers at Manchester airport have been forced to queue for hours to get through security, and Heathrow this week said 12,000 new staff were needed across the airport. EasyJet has been one of the worst-hit airlines and has been forced to cancel hundreds of flights in recent weeks following a coronavirus outbreak among staff. The airline has cancelled 5 per cent of its flights over recent days, including 58 out of 1,500 flights on Tuesday. The airline typically plans for 6% of staff to be off sick at any one time, and can handle about double this before it needs to start cancelling flights. But some bases had been hit by as much as 20 per cent of its staff off work, making it impossible to run flights as planned, said easyJet’s CE Johan Lundgren. The cancellations have been made well in advance and most passengers have been rebooked to fly on the same day. Lundgren said it was the airline’s “absolute focus” to operate with as little disruption as possible in the coming weeks, but warned that absence rates had not started improving yet. The operational disruptions come as easyJet ramps up its flying schedules. It flew 80% of its 2019 number of seats in March, and expects to increase this to 90% in the current quarter, which runs from April to June.<br/>
https://portal.staralliance.com/cms/news/hot-topics/2022-04-13/unaligned/easyjet-hit-by-wave-of-staff-sickness-as-pressure-grows-on-travel-industry
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EasyJet hit by wave of staff sickness as pressure grows on travel industry
EasyJet has said an unprecedented wave of staff sickness has led to flight cancellations as the UK airline industry struggles to cope with a surge in demand that the low-cost carrier expects will increase in the coming months. The airline on Tuesday said there had been a “strong and sustained” recovery since the UK government lifted all travel restrictions in late January, with leisure bookings for the summer holidays soaring ahead of 2019 levels over the past six weeks. The rapid recovery follows two bruising years and has left carriers across Europe scrambling to restore flight schedules as they struggle to meet the growing demand for flying amid chronic staff shortages, caused by cost cuts during the pandemic and a new wave of Covid-19 infections. British Airways has cancelled scores of flights, while passengers at Manchester airport have been forced to queue for hours to get through security, and Heathrow this week said 12,000 new staff were needed across the airport. EasyJet has been one of the worst-hit airlines and has been forced to cancel hundreds of flights in recent weeks following a coronavirus outbreak among staff. The airline has cancelled 5 per cent of its flights over recent days, including 58 out of 1,500 flights on Tuesday. The airline typically plans for 6% of staff to be off sick at any one time, and can handle about double this before it needs to start cancelling flights. But some bases had been hit by as much as 20 per cent of its staff off work, making it impossible to run flights as planned, said easyJet’s CE Johan Lundgren. The cancellations have been made well in advance and most passengers have been rebooked to fly on the same day. Lundgren said it was the airline’s “absolute focus” to operate with as little disruption as possible in the coming weeks, but warned that absence rates had not started improving yet. The operational disruptions come as easyJet ramps up its flying schedules. It flew 80% of its 2019 number of seats in March, and expects to increase this to 90% in the current quarter, which runs from April to June.<br/>
