United vehemently rejects Delta’s request for flexibility on Haneda slots

United Airlines has come out swinging against Delta Air Lines’ request to the US government for “gateway flexibility” for flights to Tokyo Haneda from the USA. The Chicago-based carrier said on 8 May in a sharply-worded filing with the US DoT that its competitor’s request is a “self-serving scheme” that is “clearly not in the public interest”. “The department should reject Delta’s latest self-serving scheme for an unprecedented and untested ‘pilot programme’ for ‘limited’ gateway flexibility at Tokyo Haneda, just as the department has rejected Delta’s and others’ prior requests for gateway flexibility, and should continue to use its own unbiased judgement in allocating rights based upon a full and complete assessment of public benefits,” the carrier writes. Last week, Delta Air Lines asked the US government to relax slot rules for flights between the USA and Tokyo’s Haneda International airport due to a “fundamentally changed” demand environment. The Atlanta-based carrier said in its DOT filing on 1 May that demand assumptions for various routes from the USA are “no longer valid” in the post-Covid-19 era, and “need to be reassessed and refined to align capacity to actual demand”. The airline holds slots to serve Haneda from seven US cities: Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle, Detroit, Minneapolis-St Paul, Portland and Honolulu. Delta says demand on those routes has recovered only 64% or less. In the first quarter of 2023, it operated flights to Haneda from just the first four of those cities. The global pandemic, it says, “materially altered the competitive landscape” on flights between the USA and Japan’s capital. American Airlines on 2 May filed a short response to the DOT in support of the proposal. “As a current US-Haneda slot holder, American supports the requested relief,” American writes. “Enabling flexible, market-based decision-making for US-Haneda service is warranted in the current demand environment.” ”Gateway flexibility for up to two current slot pairs would create public benefits by allowing all participating carriers to adapt their networks to the evolving conditions in this market consistent with Open Skies principles,” American adds. But United wholly rejects that premise. The airline says that Delta paints an unrealistic picture of the demand environment between the USA and Japan. <br/>