Aurigny has released its Group Annual Report for 2018 and its audited accounts for the year ending December 2018.
The year showed an improved financial performance approaching break-even on the Guernsey to UK routes and showed some improvement on the Alderney losses. However, according to the airline, these results were set against an airline environment where routes were stable and quasi open skies had little or no impact.
The 2018 report and accounts indicate a positive picture from the previous year, however they are not indicative of the current climate and whilst Aurigny say they are happy to operate in an Open Skies environment, they feel this is not on a ‘level playing field’ with “heavy subsidies on competing routes sets us at a disadvantage”.
Competition on London routes will have a negative financial impact in 2019, states the report, and Aurigny says it will be hit harder if further subsidies are given to competing airlines.
The Alderney routes remain a financial challenge and due to the delayed PSO and revised tender process Aurigny predicts no change in 2019.
The arrival of the three new ATRs later in 2019 will see the average age of the fleet reduce significantly with the associated new aircraft benefits of reduced maintenance costs, as well as improvements to customer service and reliability.
Whilst Aurigny presents the report with a cautionary note of a negative financial impact in 2019, they confirm that 2019 has continued to see a further improvement in punctuality with the first six months showing 83.3% of flights within 15 minutes of schedule (including delays as a result of weather), compared with 81.1% for the same period in 2018.
