LONDON – Despite all of the good news surrounding the part-restoration of international travel, it isn’t all daisies at Ryanair, with the airline fearing now Boeing 737 MAX deliveries before the start of the Summer and warns of higher air fares in 2022.
The Group CEO Michael O’Leary stated that he “is quite upset with Boeing”, having already reduced its delivery forecast of the MAX 200 Gamechanger from 40 down to 16 back in March this year.
“We are now being told the first delivery will be in late May. I am not sure we necessarily believe that. As the management team in Seattle continues to mismanage that process I think there is a real risk we might not see any of these aircraft in advance of summer 2021″.
On top of this, the airline is in talks with the manufacturer to be supplied the MAX 10 variant, but the Chief Financial Officer Neil Sorahan stated that “we are not quite there on price yet”.
The airline believes that it will have 60 MAX aircraft in its fleet by Summer 2022, offering once again another forecast towards the aircraft.
O’Leary also mentioned that airline passengers will be hit by price hikes next year due to over a quarter of seats being reduced in the total market.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that prices will rise, particularly during the peaks of the bank holiday weekends, the school holiday travel period,” he told BBC Breakfast.
This of course is not good news, especially with the airline posting a $990 million loss in the 12 months to March 31. This of course is the reason why O’Leary is being vocal about a plethora of things currently.
