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Virgin Atlantic to end Pakistan flights

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Virgin Atlantic is terminating its Pakistan flights later this year as the airline continues to restructure its route network following the pandemic.

Flights to Lahore will end on 1st May whilst flights to Islamabad will continue a while longer, until 9th July.

Virgin confirmed the news to us in a statement:

Virgin Atlantic to end Pakistan flights

“It is with regret that we’ve taken the difficult decision to suspend our services between London Heathrow and Pakistan. Since commencing operations in December 2020, we have been proud to offer choice for customers travelling between London and Manchester in the UK, and Islamabad and Lahore in Pakistan. During that time, we have also provided important cargo capacity, as well as delivering vital medical supplies. ​

This is not a decision we have taken lightly, and we’d like to apologise for any inconvenience caused.  We would like to wholeheartedly thank everyone in Pakistan; our customers, teams, partners and the authorities for their support over the past two years.”​

Both flights were launched in August 2020 as a way to diversify away from the United States, which didn’t re-open to tourists for another 15 months. The routes catered to the ‘visiting friends and family’ market which remained fairly buoyant during covid.

Virgin Atlantic clearly feels it can use those aircraft more profitably on other routes. As well as forthcoming new routes to the Maldives and Turks & Caicos, two more new routes were rumoured to be on the cards.

The Korean press has speculated that Seoul may be one of them – home of Virgin’s upcoming SkyTeam partner Korean Air – with a deal done to get EU approval for the pending Korean / Asiana merger.

The move may also have been spurred by rumours that the EU flight ban of Pakistan International Airlines will soon be lifted. This was imposed following the crash of a PIA flight in Karachi in May 2020, after which it was found that 262 PIA pilots were flying under fake qualifications.

​If you are booked to travel after the final flights you should expect to receive an email in the coming days. Virgin Atlantic says it will accommodate customers with a full refund or “where applicable” rebooking.

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Category

Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

Comments (24)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • bafan says:
    14 Feb14 February 03:24

    Dublin used to have DUB-JFK on AA on a domestic 757. It was awful. Didn’t even have IFE.

  • BJ says:
    14 Feb14 February 05:24

    Virgin really need to settle their network, the frequent changes undermine confidence in booking with them. We would like to redeem on PVG but don’t for this reason, and reported difficulties associated with HKG being dropped.

    • Rhys says:
      14 Feb14 February 09:20

      They are settling their network – that’s what this is all about!

    • Dan says:
      14 Feb14 February 10:06

      What’s the risk? The law is your friend, if they cancel the route you can have them put you on another airline

  • Zed says:
    14 Feb14 February 07:56

    I literally booked flights for the family to Pakistan 2 nights ago, then received this email from Virgin. Had used my points and companion vouchers to fly upper class. Virgin’s email refers to potential rebooking options. Any chance they’ll put on another airline?

    • Rhys says:
      14 Feb14 February 09:21

      I would insist on it. Have a look at what your options are and be prepared to fight. You may not be able to get on the airline of your choice, but you can probably argue flight timings as close to your original booking as possible.

    • yorkieflyer says:
      14 Feb14 February 22:50

      you’re lucky to have just booked, they will have to rebook you on a revenue flight, whatever you do don’t accept a refund

      • Zed says:
        14 Feb14 February 23:04

        Our outbound is upper class and return is premium. The upper class equivalent is business class, but what happens if there is no premium equivalent available. Upgrade? Downgrade? Or something else?

  • SamG says:
    14 Feb14 February 07:58

    I wonder if they’re having issues with remittance from Pakistan , there were some articles yesterday about their low FX reserves

  • Peter says:
    14 Feb14 February 08:16

    Yes Virgin has not been offering rebookings as they are required under EU flight regulations, even escalation to executive team didn’t help. Now are forced to return 2 days later from Hong Kong because they have a black out period over Easter for rebookings. Taking them to court seemed too risky.

    • Rhys says:
      14 Feb14 February 09:22

      Why risky? EU261 seems pretty clear on the subject.

      • JDB says:
        14 Feb14 February 09:55

        All litigation carries risk. If your journey is too close to get a CEDR/MCOL resolution prior to travel, it requires you actually to pay for the new tickets with a view to being reimbursed; not everybody can afford that or wants the uncertainty. While in many circumstances you are almost certain to win, there are other permutations short of a full win. Many just don’t want the aggro, so flying two days late maybe far from ideal, but it’s a pragmatic and no risk solution that would appeal to many.

      • Peter says:
        15 Feb15 February 10:16

        Yes, it would have been £9000 to book replacement flights and the court costs are £500 for that amount

  • Sun7 says:
    14 Feb14 February 11:01

    I am taking a guess that Virgin would expand to Bangalore since there is mention of profitablity and BA is the only other competition on ths route.

    • blenz101 says:
      14 Feb14 February 12:21

      Seems unlikely if you look at the types of destinations they are now flying. ME3 compete heavily with BA on routes to India in any event.

  • Chris D says:
    14 Feb14 February 12:09

    All virgin seem to do is cancel routes. Wasn’t long ago that they flew to Tokyo, Hong Kong, Dubai, Sydney and Cancun (I used them all on all those routes!). Now they’re just an arm of Delta, barely even a British airline. The move away from Gatwick feels short-sighted too — are they operating fewer flights than pre Covid?

    • Rob says:
      14 Feb14 February 12:14

      They picked quite a few extra Heathrow slots, mainly from KLM. They presumably have what they need for what they want to do and it cut out a huge amount of overhead.

    • yorkieflyer says:
      14 Feb14 February 22:54

      yes I’m pissed that they just seem to be USA or leisure routes

  • Nick says:
    14 Feb14 February 15:15

    It’s not ‘odd’ at all that AA don’t fly between Dublin and New York. That’s an incredibly competitive route for the volume of passengers, so far riskier money-wise than (say) CLT, which opens up any number of unserved destinations across the south.

    AA are also thinking ahead to when EI join the AJB, when they get triple-daily service on this route without even trying.

    • Kevin says:
      14 Feb14 February 23:55

      What’s AJB Nick?

      I flew DUB-CLT last summer and connected on to Las Vegas. £1100 return in J class. Superb experience. Sadly, this summer we’ll be lucky to get the same ticket for 3 times that price!

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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