The global financial crisis failed to cast a shadow over British Airways’ performance in the Chinese market as the carrier plans to raise its flight frequencies on the Shanghai-London route to tap booming demand, an official of the airline said yesterday.
BA plans to operate six weekly flights on the route by the end of this year from the five weekly now.
Robert Xia, trade sales manager of BA China, said, ‘We have submitted our proposal to add a weekly flight on the route to the aviation regulator and expect the new service to start by the end of this year.’
With the 2010 Shanghai World Expo and the 2012 London Olympic Games looming, the carrier also intends to operate daily on the profitable route in the near future.
Xia said BA started to make money from the three-year-old route last year and has seen sales rise more than 10% so far this year, with average load factor exceeding 90%.
BA has started to operate the route out of Terminal 5 at London’s Heathrow Airport, which is exclusively used by the airline. This is more important than you think. Flying from Terminal 4 gives you a foretaste of hell.
Source: China Trade Information