Tour operator and airline Jet2 has blasted “inexcusable” airport chaos as it warned its current year performance will depend on how quickly services can return to normal. The travel group said it has been “directly impacted” by the disruption and accused airports and suppliers of being “woefully ill-prepared and poorly resourced”.
It said customers have had to endure a “very much poorer experience” than they should have, with passengers hit by flight delays, cancellations, long queues, baggage handling problems, and a lack of onboard catering supplies. Jet2 executive chairman Philip Meeson said: “Most of our 10 UK base airports have been woefully ill-prepared and poorly resourced for the volume of customers they could reasonably expect.”
He said issues were “inexcusable, bearing in mind our flights have been on sale for many months and our load factors are quite normal”. Mr Meeson added: "This difficult return to normal operations has occurred simply because of the lack of planning, preparedness and unwillingness to invest by many airports and associated suppliers."
The company said average prices of its package holidays rose two per cent to £689, after hotels slashed costs the previous year, but said prices are likely to come under pressure this year as the cost-of-living crisis affects consumer spending. The firm said it has handed its staff an 8% pay increase, with a further £1,000 to be paid to all colleagues at the end of the summer season in recognition of their hard work in difficult times.
Jet2.com and Jet2holidays have once again been ranked respectively as the best airline and best tour operator for customer satisfaction, according to the latest bi-annual UK Customer Satisfaction Index (UKCSI).
Steve Heapy, chief executive of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, said: “The UKCSI provides a definitive insight into how customers feel about different companies, so we are delighted to be recognised as the best airline and tour operator for customer satisfaction once again. Our teams put an enormous amount of investment and hard work into providing the best customer service in the industry and that is reflected in this latest study.
"During the pandemic we continued to build our strong reputation for looking after customers, thanks to the way that we provided speedy and smooth refunds. We have very much continued that customer-first approach as travel has reopened and demand has bounced back, and we continue to focus relentlessly on delivering our industry-leading standard of customer satisfaction.”
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