Holidaymakers have been dealt another blow today as one airline claimed plane ticket prices could rise by 10 per cent this summer. The boss of Wizz Air said tickets are already more expensive now than they were before the pandemic struck.
Jozsef Varadi expects prices to increase even further, likely by "upper single digits", in the company’s second quarter, which runs between July and September. It means fares could rise by close to 10 per cent, although the company did not reveal any more detailed assessment of where they are likely to go.
Mr Varadi said: “Our bookings are showing strong performance in the first fiscal quarter, with average fares trending higher at low single digits versus (the) same period in F20 (financial year ending March 2020). For fiscal quarter two, we expect fares in the upper single digits ahead of the equivalent period F20.”
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Wizz Air also warned shareholders that recent disruption at airports will probably lead to the airline making an operating loss in the first quarter of its financial year. “Shortages of staff in air traffic control, security and other parts of the supply chain are impacting airlines, our employees and our customers directly,” Mr Varadi said.
He said that despite seeing strong consumer demand for summer, the company is expecting an operating loss for the first quarter of F23. The number of passengers Wizz carried more than doubled from 10.2 million to 27.1 million in the year to the end of March.
It comes as airline passengers have suffered widespread cancellations and long queues at airports for several months. The aviation industry is struggling to cope with the rise in demand for travel amid a severe staffing shortage.
Airports and airlines are desperately trying to recruit more workers, but there are fears the chaos could continue during the peak summer holiday period in July and August.
Some 225 departures from UK airports were cancelled between Monday and Friday last week, according to aviation data firm Cirium.
