NEWS FLASH
Europe's busiest low cost airline, Ryanair, has said that Air Serbia receives large discounts from its hub airport and notes that the airline, together with other flag carriers around Europe which enjoy similar incentives, would be unable to pay them back. The budget carrier's Chief Commercial Officer, David O'Brien, said, "When the regulator demanded for Ryanair to repay all of its discounts at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport, we did so immediately, which once again confirmed our high creditworthiness. But at the same time, no one demanded similar action from airlines such as Air France-KLM. Perhaps because this could undermine their financial situation. What we certainly will soon see, for example, in Serbia, if there is the political will, is a requirement for Air Serbia to repay its debt to Belgrade Airport, which it will be unable to do, in our opinion". Mr O'Brien says that flag carriers enjoy many discounts which are not on offer to Ryanair. Under a takeover agreement between Etihad Airways and the Serbian government, Air Serbia has been exempt from paying a number of services at Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport. According to the airline's Chairman, these subsidies ended on January 27, 2016.
I would have thought that the sandwich eaters would be out in force blaming FR for exposing the BEG situation.
ReplyDeleteProbably the party line is to ignore the news and hoping that it goes away.
oh dear I thought that only we in Macedonia have the sandwich eaters
DeleteHere in Serbia we have legions of them, thankfully they are concentrated mainly in Belgrade.
DeleteO'Brien held exactly the same speech on Tuesday in Sofia where he bashed Sofia Airport for not soliciting Bulgaria Air's almost 30 million euro debt. Apparently these two capital city markets are actually quite interesting for Ryanair once they become a level playing field and not the domain of state-backed carriers.
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DeleteThey should first fly to Belgrade before complaining.
DeleteFly to Belgrade and subsidize ASL?
DeleteWhy would they do that?
This tells me they are interested in Belgrade or even seriously considering it.
ReplyDeleteAs long as Serbija is not an EU member Ryanair or any other airline can not seriously threaten JU, or BEG, or the Government into stopping all forms of state assistance and let market forces decide who wins and who looses.
ReplyDeleteThe state should think really good before deciding to join European Union because many state owned or majority state owned companies would have to be privatized.
Yes, lets stay out of E.U. so that party members can keep "working" at state companies for huge salaries...
DeleteSMFH!
You think with EU everything will get better ?!
DeleteLook at Greece - it will become even worse .
The problem of Greece isn't the EU. The problem of Greece is that the country was falsifying their budget for years which have led to massive debts.
Delete@Dejan Serbia, as a candidate member state, has to abide by the same state aid regulations as any EU state. As such, state aid to Air Serbia in a form of airport subsidy has to be approved by a state commission in line with EU regulations. If not, that subsidy will be examined and potentially repaid once Serbia joins the EU.
DeleteManagement of Ryanair has a track record of statements characterized as "offensive" and "daft". They even called their own customers "stupid". Their CEO was quoted as saying: "Short of committing murder, bad publicity sells more seats". Simply discard CCO's comments, they are looking for free PR in Ex Yu region.
ReplyDeleteOh this must have been like throwing salt on an open wound for you. :( Imagine, now your precious Air Serbia will have to deal with Ryanair which is determined to put an end to the subsidies JU receives. :(
Deletesubsidies ended 5 months ago.
DeleteIf you pay close attention, FR is not just speaking about subsidies but also about the fact that JU is not paying its due to BEG.
DeleteUmm that was the subsidy. That it didn't have to pay handling/lading in full. Now it does.
DeleteFinally someone is talking about this, the truth must come out.
ReplyDeleteYou had that "Truth" in the takeover agreement which is published on the Serbian government's website. So you have had it available for 3 years and there you can also see when the subsidies stop, ie they have already stopped.
DeleteYes and they are speaking of how it was illegal just like the aid Malev got was illegal.
DeleteIt was initial investment into airline paid in the form of subsidies over 3 years. Nothing wrong with it unlike Malev.
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