Emirates and London Heathrow Airport have reached a facing-saving “compromise” on what became a high-stakes game of chicken with each side blaming the other for a summer of delays and cancellations.
Emirates + London Heathrow Save Face After Row Over Passenger Caps
London Heathrow announced that it would cap the number of departing passengers at 100,000 per day for the remainder of the summer, as it found itself and its staff unable to cope with the crowds. But beyond the draconian possibility of revoking landing rights, it is not the airport but airlines which control their schedules and passenger manifests.
While other carriers seemed to grumblingly agree to the cutbacks, Emirates flat-out refused, issuing a terse statement arguing it and its passengers would not be held responsible for the poor planning of the airport and other airlines.
After extensive meetings involving Sir Tim Clark, Emirates’ President, and John Holland-Kaye, CEO of Heathrow Airport, the two have kissed and made up, with Emirates agreeing to “cap” selling more tickets but insisting upon not cancelling any flights.
Here is the joint statement issued by the two carriers:
“The President of Emirates Airline and the CEO of Heathrow Airport held a constructive meeting this morning. Emirates agreed the airline was ready and willing to work with the airport to remediate the situation over the next 2 weeks, to keep demand and capacity in balance and provide passengers with a smooth and reliable journey through Heathrow this summer.
“Emirates has capped further sales on its flights out of Heathrow until mid-August to assist Heathrow in its resource ramp up, and is working to adjust capacity. In the meantime, Emirates flights from Heathrow operate as scheduled and ticketed passengers may travel as booked.”
The beauty of this statement is that both sides save face and Emirates actually agrees to nothing, since it might well “cap” sales at 100%…there is no explanation of what capacity further sales will be capped.
CONCLUSION
Emirates and London Heathrow are no longer sparring partners, agreeing to set aside their differences…and do nothing. But the perception is that a compromise has been struck and if there is a compromise, it is in the careful language of both sides.
Like so many realms of diplomacy, barks tend to be worse than bites. Here, Heathrow Airport hopes to strong-arm airlines into voluntary compliance via peer pressure over passenger caps. In reality, there’s only so much Heathrow can do to force airlines to comply, short of hiring even more staff (precisely the problem) to count the number of passengers from each carrier or make the draconian move of actually revoking slots, which would lead to a bevy of legal challenges.
Given August holiday bookings I would imagine most of those flights were already sold at 95%. With few high yield business travelers in August they lose nothing really on last minute premium bookings. And for the few that may come up EK can get them out of Gatwick. Total win for EK.
If I was CEO of Heathrow I would be more concerned with fixing the problem quickly. While more a long-term fix, they could at least be looking at ways with the Govt. to allow special work visas for Eastern Europeans to come in that will fill the non-security positions. With a reward that after two years of being on the job they can convert to permanent residency if they choose.
Also, off topic as to Heathrow, but still another example of creative recruiting, United is heavily promoting $10K sign up bonuses for ramp agents around the U.S. Companies are starting to figure out that this employment issue is not going away anytime soon and they need to step up in offering more to attract people.
> With a reward that after two years of being on the job they can convert to permanent residency if they choose.
You mean the current ruling party in the UK? More likely a seat on a deportation flight to Rwanda…
Who is suppose to pay for Heathrow’s wonderful ideas? If airlines cut a % of departing passengers, I can imagine this will add up to a LOT of lost revenue. No wonder why Emirates is enraged.
Isn’t Heathrow also shooting themselves in the foot as this would also impact airport passenger landing fees, passenger facility charges, UK APD, etc.
Lets solve the problem, not the symptom.
Knowing the EK culture, this is exactly how they work. They are masters at this. I for one, don’t blame them. I just flew out of LHR today and the place is a zoo.
So basically Emirates “won”?
Yep.