Aer Lingus Fleet/ Routes Discussion Pt 2 (ALL possible routes included)

L1011

HTCOne wrote: »

Did they used to have 6 321 ceos?

Yes - CPC to CPH. C/D/F were shifted off quite some time ago at this stage.

HTCOne

L1011 wrote: »

Yes - CPC to CPH. C/D/F were shifted off quite some time ago at this stage.

Thought so. Seem to remember them all being owned outright and 3 of them being flogged in a time of crisis for some quick cash. Also seem to recall one getting banged up on the delivery flight.

Tenger

HTCOne wrote: »

Did they used to have 6 321 ceos?

First Airbus narrowbody for EI. I think it was 3 each in 98 and 99.

I'm guessing 3 owned and 3 leased based on the fact that they reduced to only 3 in recent years.

Based on their fuel/operational efficiency EI then switched their fleet to A320 from their previous mostly B737 shorthaul fleet.

Shamrockj

I wonder what the reasoning is behind keeping one single A321ceo

goingnowhere

First 3 were leased, the second 3 are owned outright

When times were tough it was a A330 that was sold/leased back

Locker10a

California Dreamer wrote: »

The first 3 CEO's were sold after 911.

Pretty sure it was later than that ! Like around 2010!?

California Dreamer

Locker10a wrote: »

Pretty sure it was later than that ! Like around 2010!?

Well that told me so!

kevinandrew

EI-CPC/D/F all went to Ural Airlines within a month of each other between December 2010 and January 2011.

Captain_Crash

Locker10a wrote: »

Pretty sure it was later than that ! Like around 2010!?

I flew on CPF in late 2010 and they left they fleet soon after, so they were gonna early 2011 at the latest.

cson

Anyone know when Christmas 2021 flights will be loaded into the system?

theguzman

EI-DEO arrived into Dublin from Amsterdam today with the first doses of the Moderna Covid19 vaccine.

https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/ei-deo#268c96d2

https://twitter.com/DonnellyStephen/status/1349044903431577604?s=20

Jack1985

cson wrote: »

Anyone know when Christmas 2021 flights will be loaded into the system?

Hopefully within in the next few weeks, the EI booking system and background check-in system ASTRAL are archaic and overdue replacement. The system does not allow more than 365 day in-advance booking, which many other airlines do and it results in EI having to delay schedule launches as a result something that has annoyed many Exec's particularly during Covid and should hopefully mean investment occurs.

goingnowhere

330 days is the booking window, if the flights are loaded.

It is actually really sensible as it stops accidental wrong year bookings as you cannot accidentally book Jan 2022 today as seats tend to be sold in the weeks prior to departure.

I don't see how it delays a route launch, Budapest had been suspended due COViD, flights all cancelled, not a zero out situation. First morning after green-list was announced BUD was back bookable.

Booking years in advance conveys no benefit unless you desperately want to get seat 3k on a A330. You get charged the default fares which will be reduced in a promotion 3-6 months before travel

Jack1985

goingnowhere wrote: »

It is actually really sensible as it stops accidental wrong year bookings as you cannot accidentally book Jan 2022 today as majority of flights are sold in the weeks prior to departure.

That is a completely redundant argument. It's an archaic system that was not designed for more than 330 day-in advance booking and has long needed to be replaced, it piss*d of top exec's who weren't able to activate Summer 21 early for example with Travel Agents after years of being pushed down the pecking order for investment. CCO David Shepherd said as much this Summer.

goingnowhere wrote: »

Booking years in advance conveys no benefit unless you desperately want to get seat 3k on a A330. You get charged the default fares which will be reduced in a promotion 3-6 months before travel

Having flexiblity during a booking season i.e. Nov 21 to Apr 22 is a requirment for Travel Agent bookings, EI has to delay these seat launches for extended periods to provide this. Carriers like easyJet, Jet2 have seat sales up to April 2022.

goingnowhere

I don't know of any carrier apart from Easyjet which allows booking more than 365 days in advance

https://thepointsguy.com/guide/how-far-advance-book-flight/

330-365 is the norm, I was under the impression there was a global IT restriction of 365 days on airline tickets. Just like the fact boarding cards are stupid and have no concept of year just the days since Jan1

LiamaDelta

Jack1985 wrote: »

Hopefully within in the next few weeks, the EI booking system and background check-in system ASTRAL are archaic and overdue replacement. The system does not allow more than 365 day in-advance booking, which many other airlines do and it results in EI having to delay schedule launches as a result something that has annoyed many Exec's particularly during Covid and should hopefully mean investment occurs.

Surely this would be an opportune time to migrate to a new system. I would imagine that there's a certain amount of manual transfer of bookings required and there will (hopefully) never be a time when there are less bookings in the system.

billy few mates

How big a problem is it that you're trying to solve...?
I can't think of any reason why someone would want to book a flight a year or more in advance.
I did a lot of flying before this all kicked off but most of the flights I booked were rarely more than a couple of weeks in advance except for the odd one to a major sporting event in which case I might book a couple of months in advance.
Most of us don't know where we're going to be in six months time never mind twelve months and plans have a habit of changing, my guess is there are very few people who need this level of certainty or comfort to be able to book a flight a year or more in advance.

cson

goingnowhere wrote: »

I don't know of any carrier apart from Easyjet which allows booking more than 365 days in advance

https://thepointsguy.com/guide/how-far-advance-book-flight/

330-365 is the norm, I was under the impression there was a global IT restriction of 365 days on airline tickets. Just like the fact boarding cards are stupid and have no concept of year just the days since Jan1

Air France do, I assume KLM by extension because those flights show up bookable on AF.

Has there been any more movement on the AA JV/OneWorld hook up?

Tenger

LiamaDelta wrote: »

Surely this would be an opportune time to migrate to a new system. I would imagine that there's a certain amount of manual transfer of bookings required and there will (hopefully) never be a time when there are less bookings in the system.

No chance at all.
A new system is a massive investment.
No way they will spend cash on a non-essential (but certainly long overdue) upgrade at this time.

Shamrockj

LiamaDelta wrote: »

Surely this would be an opportune time to migrate to a new system. I would imagine that there's a certain amount of manual transfer of bookings required and there will (hopefully) never be a time when there are less bookings in the system.

Because it as an unnecessary cost especially now.. as far as I know they own the system they are using them so it’s not costing them to use it.

goingnowhere

Moving to FLY would in a normal year add up to 50 million in costs as Amadeus charge something like 5 euro a PNR

EI offer Astral at 50 cent a PNR...

cson

Now's the time to do it, they could probably get a good deal from Amadeus/Sabre/Etc given the circumstances (and indeed more focused support if the provider is not as busy), and pain points from the switch over lessened due to smaller capacity/pax carried.

I'd confidently speculate that it'd help in a big way to be able to plug into AA and sell J ex USA to Europe. Particularly if the connections can be done on A321neo's which have a true short haul J product as opposed to the blocked seat bollox everyone else does. There's huge opportunity for EI here.

Jack1985

goingnowhere wrote: »

Moving to FLY would in a normal year add up to 50 million in costs as Amadeus charge something like 5 euro a PNR

EI offer Astral at 50 cent a PNR...

Yeah and airlines pay full list prices for aircraft too.

cson wrote: »

Now's the time to do it, they could probably get a good deal from Amadeus/Sabre/Etc given the circumstances (and indeed more focused support if the provider is not as busy), and pain points from the switch over lessened due to smaller capacity/pax carried.

I'd confidently speculate that it'd help in a big way to be able to plug into AA and sell J ex USA to Europe. Particularly if the connections can be done on A321neo's which have a true short haul J product as opposed to the blocked seat bollox everyone else does. There's huge opportunity for EI here.

There is a plan from IAG to move a centralised booking system that one would imagine would encompass features that prior prevented such booking flexibility for airlines, I know no specific time-frame on its final implementation at this time. Lack of investment in area's raises its ugly head once in a while, the BA fiasco that resulted in days of cancellations a consequence of bad IT policy at that time. The integration of IT platforms in IAG has been slower than expected to date, at a time most convenient to implement such changes.

lintdrummer

Good article here on the development of the Astral system.
I would say that getting use today out of a system that was developed in 1968 is a serious return on investment. A huge investment at that time of course (£2m) but the company were at the forefront of technology as a result. Hard to see similar investments being made today.

Marcusm

Tenger wrote: »

No chance at all.
A new system is a massive investment.
No way they will spend cash on a non-essential (but certainly long overdue) upgrade at this time.

Unsure about the airline sector but you will find that for many large corporates, transformational change via systems upgrades has been accelerated by Covid. Simplifying processes and reducing necessary reprocessing with ancillary headcount reductions. Many of the airlines don’t have the capital but some do.

Third_Echelon

Marcusm wrote: »

Unsure about the airline sector but you will find that for many large corporates, transformational change via systems upgrades has been accelerated by Covid. Simplifying processes and reducing necessary reprocessing with ancillary headcount reductions. Many of the airlines don’t have the capital but some do.

Yup. I work in the large enterprise software sector and I can tell you that 2020 was probably the busiest year in quite a while. Solutions were implemented quite rapidly from medium companies right up to the biggest names in the world to keep their business moving during COVID or even pivot completely.

If the cash was there, quite a few took the opportunity to make changes that had been put on the long finger for years.

Third_Echelon

Shamrockj wrote: »

Because it as an unnecessary cost especially now.. as far as I know they own the system they are using them so it’s not costing them to use it.

For a system that old the maintenance costs could be quite high. If there is specialised knowledge required, they could be paying big retainers to a small group of engineers. Guessing on my part of course on the above, but certainly isn't costing them 'nothing'.

LiamaDelta

Shamrockj wrote: »

Because it as an unnecessary cost especially now.. as far as I know they own the system they are using them so it’s not costing them to use it.

By the sounds of things it's very necessary, and there will probably never be a cheaper and better time to do it. I agree cash is king at the moment, but if you've depended on a system for so long and never upgraded it then you only have two choices, outsource or hire the staff in-house and build (another) bespoke system. It's too late for the latter. Reading the article above, when they built ASTRAL in the 60's it was an enormous investment but turned out it paid for itself in 3-4 years. I'm not saying this would be the same because they are effectively catching up with everyone else rather than leading the industry as they were back then, but generally if a company isn't spending on capital investment like this it will come back to haunt them. I have a feeling that the BA/IAG culture of sweating the assets is what's driving this and we have all seen how BA has suffered in not valuing investment in IT.

PinOnTheRight

Fond memories of using Astral, I knew it was old but didn't realise it was developed in the 60s.

Muscle memory still recalls some of the commands for doing weight and balance, can't say I used the reservations side of it.
FG/FC/FF/SS/ML/AUTO/PR/LP/LS...:D

Tenger

lintdrummer wrote: »

About 20 years ago I had the pleasure of working in a section of EI populated with some real veterans.
One gent there had actually completed a computer programming course in 1967 (or maybe 1969) hoping to transfer into the new EI “computer section”
He was a wealth of information and stories from those halcyon days of Aer Lingus in the 70s & 80s. (For those who may know of him his brother was a very well known radio/TV host)

There were also 5-6 others gents with similar lineage. From a guy who used to go cargo flight jumpseating around the World on his holidays to a couple of engineers who were deployed to Africa or Asia on contracts in the early 80s.
I liked aircraft before my stint there, but that placement really made me enthralled with the entire industry.