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Air New Zealand gets £20m for its London Heathrow landing and take-off slots

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Air New Zealand is ending services from the UK in October when it closes its Heathrow – Los Angeles – Auckland route.

Our article on the Air New Zealand UK closure is here.

Forbes is claiming that Air New Zealand received £20m (NZ$42m) for its daily take-off and landing slot.

Air New Zealand gets £20m for its London Heathrow slots

This may seem a lot, but it is well below the record $75m paid to Kenya Airways by Oman Air a couple of years ago.  The Air New Zealand price was hampered by the fact that the slots are not in the peak early morning period.

It is not clear which airline has bought the slots.

This trade acts as a stark reminder of why airlines will fly empty planes from Heathrow, for months if necessary, during coronavirus to ensure that their slots are retained.

The new ‘season’ starts in late March and a slot must be used on 80% of days during the following seven months (Winter starts in late October) if they are not to be forfeited.  The only way to circumvent this is by Government order.

Comments (69)

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  • Susan says:

    What are the chances of a govt order to protect the LHR slots? Rotations of empty planes with all their noise and pollution damage simply to retain future rights would seem to be daft if a quick signature from the transport secretary can obviate the need: the airport gets a rest from running at full stretch, the airlines don’t fly empty planes and everyone gets the benefit of a lighter environmental impact.

    • TGLoyalty says:

      I believe it needs EU ratification.

      • Shoestring says:

        [Yesterday Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, wrote to the European Commission urging it to drop EU-wide rules that force airlines to operate “ghost” flights to retain their landing slots at airports. This could lead to a sharp increase in cancelled flights.]

    • Nick_C says:

      And it was raised at PMQ’s last week

  • SAVVYTYKE says:

    So does this present an opportunity for the single flyer to buy avios for an off peak long haul flight during the Corona Virus current environment ?

    • Anna says:

      You could, but cash fees seem to be low at the moment and your travel plans risk being disrupted as the Coronavirus situation continues to unfold. Also we’ll soon be in peak pricing period for the Easter holidays.

  • paulm says:

    I read yesterday that Oman air have brought the slot so they can start 3rd daily flight

  • Bhavin says:

    Correction…Oman air paid kenya airways

  • KP says:

    Yes Oman paid KQ, not the other way round

    • Alex Sm says:

      It was obvious from the very beginning. If one applies a bit of logic

  • marcw says:

    Rob, the (northern) summer IATA season is 7 months long (the winter, only 5 months). I guess you know this, but you wrote 6 months in the article.

  • George K says:

    OT: I’ve got a Lloyds voucher booking for Canada in June. Can someone remind me what, if any, rebooking options I’ve got without losing the voucher? The voucher itself has expired (so cancelling would not make it come back in my account), but I seem to recall that there was an option to move the dates (with the usual £35 fee) and keep the same destination (or another in the same zone?).

    It’s also entirely possible I dreamt all this…

    • TGLoyalty says:

      I believe you can move within the same zone and for up to 12 months from your original expiry date

      FYI even if it was still valid you wouldn’t get it back in you cancelled your flight.

      • rams1981 says:

        So if the voucher expired in Dec 2019 you could only use it up to Dec 2020? Has to be same zone and £35 per person change fee?

    • rams1981 says:

      so if voucher expires on 1 Dec 2019, and you booked travel for 1 Apr 20 on 1 Dec 19 you could in theory change to anywhere up to 1 Dec 20.

      • BA-Flyer says:

        That’s my understanding, yes. Also, it’s the return flight that must be completed before then, not just the outbound.

  • Andrew says:

    Bits.

    Amex:- Spend £750 Cumulatively at Dell and get £100. Online only. Valid until *September* 2020 for first 100,000 Cardholders.

    That’s one of the broadest deals that I’ve seen on Amex.

    • Lady London says:

      If anyone sees a Lenovo deal anytime soon that doesn’t require to be put through Amex please post.

      I have checked deals in a few countries and all existing deals can be bettered in another country, looking for a serious discount code as the odd 20% code is not reducing price enough below what I can get without any code in another country (looking across 5).

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