As Jo explored the Frankfurt Airport departure lounge floor to find the most comfortable place to spend the night last month, she felt the impact of the chaos gripping the aviation industry in personal level.
A routine four-hour journey with easyJet from London to Greece had become a 24-hour ordeal, beginning when the UK airline canceled its flight almost without warning. With other direct flights sold out, she was forced to cross London to a different airport for an expensive and tortuous route through Germany, which included a night stop in Frankfurt.
I, who did not want her full name to be revealed, is one of hundreds of thousands trapped by the disruption that will affect airlines and airports this year, as passengers fly again in large numbers after the pandemic of Covid-19. A couple got married on a flight to Las Vegas after losing their own wedding. Others have complained about the ruined holidays, the loss of luggage and their pockets.
The problems, caused by staff shortages at airlines, airports and ground service companies, have been the main news in the UK after a wave of disruptions that included 500 flight cancellations the head of last week. But Europe and the United States have also felt the effects, leaving little in the way of a system struggling to deal with other operational problems, from time to time to delays in air traffic control.
In the U.S., thousands of flights were abandoned during Memorial Day vacation. In Europe, Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris canceled a quarter of its flights on Thursday after a strike, and last Saturday the Dutch airline KLM suspended passenger flights at Schiphol Airport. Amsterdam after bad weather and runway maintenance added to the overcrowding caused by staff shortages.
Fellow passenger and minister Chris Mitcham married Pam and Jeremy Salda on a flight to Las Vegas when they realized they would not arrive in time to book their wedding © Chris Mitcham
In all, 4% of global flights were canceled last Saturday, including 11% in the Netherlands, 4% of flights in Germany and 3% in the United States and the United Kingdom, according to the data provider. of the OAG sector.
The causes of the problem are interrelated. Companies have been accused of cutting too much staff when the pandemic first occurred and after being desperately prepared for the return of passengers, although many had predicted that there would be a large accumulated demand for travel.
“It simply came to our notice then. . . much faster than the ability of the industry to expand, ”John Holland-Kaye, chief executive of Heathrow Airport, told the FT Global Boardroom conference this week.
The struggle of the industry to hire replacement staff has become more difficult in the tight recovery labor markets. But the crisis has also exposed the way in which an interdependent network of companies must combine perfectly to make a plane fly. When a single part of the aviation ecosystem falters, it causes a cascading disruption across the supply chain.
The industry has gone through an “existential crisis” over the past two years, Holland-Kaye said. “No income [and] very high fixed costs. . . Rebuilding that capacity is very difficult. ”
The bounce
Two years ago, in the midst of the Covid blockade, airlines were fighting for survival, focusing on reducing costs as passengers disappeared and losses increased. Perceiving a threat to their business, bosses cut staff. In April 2020, Lufthansa estimated that it was burning 1 million euros per hour.
Passengers face long delays as airlines and airports struggle to re-hire large numbers of staff laid off during the pandemic © Phil Nijhuis / EPA / Shutterstock
BA cut about 10,000 of its 42,000 workers, a move described as “voluntary destruction” by a UK parliamentary committee. However, many of his rivals took similar steps.
The US government estimates that by September 2021, 100,000 jobs had been lost to the aerospace industry, despite giving more than $ 50 billion in support to airlines. The Swissport ground handler cut 20,000 of its 65,000 workers worldwide. In all, there were 2.3 million fewer people employed in the aviation industry in September 2021, according to research by Oxford Economics.
“With few exceptions, calls by unions for staff retention programs during the height of the crisis fell on deaf ears,” says Stephen Cotton, secretary general of the International Federation of Transport Workers. “It simply came to our notice then. . . a loss of more than 2 million skilled workers in airlines, airports, aviation services and global supply chains when the industry needs them most. “
Unions have said the impact of job losses has been exacerbated by the fact that many senior executives were included in the sacrifices. The effect of this skills and knowledge gap is only becoming apparent as companies try to rebuild themselves.
The problem has been complicated by the erratic rhythms of the pandemic. BA began hiring again late last year as border rules eased and transatlantic flights seriously resumed. But only a few weeks later, the appearance of the Omicron variant meant the imposition of new border rules.
French airport workers are protesting against low wages. Companies need to offer better job security and labor standards to compete for staff in a tight job market © Benoit Tessier / Reuters
For Willie Walsh, a former BA chief who now heads the International Air Transport Association, the industry is still suffering from the effects of divergences in government travel rules.
“With governments making changes and policy changes, there was uncertainty until the last minute, and it left little time to restart an industry that was largely inactive for two years. It’s no wonder we’re seeing operational delays. in some locations, “he says.
Tangled supply chains
The industry is by no means the only one struggling to find staff in today’s tight labor markets, but its unique safety standards put it in a particularly difficult position. Many new hires have to go through background checks before they can work. These processes can take several weeks, at which point candidates may have found another job.
Some say the sector has become less attractive to jobseekers, after two years of cuts and negative headlines. “Many of those who saw it as attractive have changed their minds,” said József Váradi, CEO of Wizz Air, a pan-European budget airline. “People have started looking at other industries and sectors to progress in their careers.”
This week, Váradi faced a reaction from the pilot unions after telling staff in a leaked internal briefing: “We can’t run this business when every fifth person in a base reports a disease because the person We are all tired, but sometimes we have to go the extra mile. “
Airlines have attributed the delays to the constant change in government policy, which they say has hampered the resumption of idle industry © Tolga Akmen / EPA-EFE / Shutterstock
While few companies have reported problems with hiring well-paid pilots, other jobs, especially working on the ground at airports, are more difficult to sell. “Be honest,” says a European industry executive. “Would you rather work in a supermarket at decent hours on a regular shift, or get up at 2 in the morning and stay in the cold at an airport?”
Cotton says companies need to offer better job security, job standards and career advancement opportunities to make the industry more attractive to future workers.
However, the scale of the disruption affecting individual airlines does not fit perfectly with the scope of job cuts. Although easyJet has been particularly hard hit this year, it has almost the same number of staff as in 2019. Wizz Air expects to have 6,700 employees by the end of the summer, more than the 4,000 before the pandemic, but it has yet to be seen. required. to cancel flights.
The problems these airlines face are largely related to their supply chains, which are vulnerable to disruptions beyond their immediate control. Although a passenger can only be in contact with two brands, the airline and the airport, the flight they take is operated by a tangle of companies, from subcontracted check-in staff providers and baggage handlers, to airport security companies and third party catering services.
Airport security is one of the many parts of the business that airlines have outsourced over the years © Stephanie Keith / Bloomberg
Over the years, airlines have outsourced as much of the business as possible. When a chain link fails, and every part of the industry has suffered staffing problems this year, the margins with which airlines operate tend to break.
Several airlines have blamed the disruption on ground workers, who offer services from refueling to billing staff, for not having enough workers. But frustrated executives at these airlines say the airlines themselves have for years reduced the margins of the contracts they offer.
Overselling recovery
In an attempt to restore order, some in the industry have questioned a system that offered reduced rates focusing on efficiency above all else. A member of the European airline board says it is clear that the system can no longer work with the margins of 2019, but that introducing new flexibility to avoid future disruptions would mean passengers would have to prepare for higher fares.
However, companies are still being criticized for overestimating how many flights they will be able to operate this summer. Five weeks ago, Lufthansa chief Carsten Spohr said her group was “mentally marking the crisis” as she predicted that this summer would bring more people “than ever”. But on Thursday, the company said it would cancel 900 flights in July, blaming “bottlenecks and staff shortages” on the industry. In the UK, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps accused airlines of having “severely oversold flights and holidays” this month.
The European air traffic control body has warned of the problems …