Ryanair Holdings Plc (LON:RYA) has redrawn its winter flight schedule in a move which it says will eliminate ‘all risk’ of future cancellations.
The budget airline said it will fly 25 fewer aircraft from November until March, and it will have 10 fewer aircraft operating from April.
It means it can roster all of the extra pilot leave for October through to the end of December.
Additionally, Ryanair said almost 40% of its annual leave requirement for 2018 during the first quarter, which it expects will remove the risk for recurring pilot rostering problems next year.
Chief executive Michael O’Leary described the schedule changes as “sensible”.
Ryanair shares rose just over 2% to trade at €16.81 per share.
“From today, there will be no more rostering related flight cancellations this winter or in summer 2018,” O’Leary added.
“Slower growth this winter, will create lots of spare aircraft and crews which will allow us to manage the exceptional volumes of annual leave we committed to delivering in the 9 months to Dec 2017.
“We will start a new 12 month leave period on the 1st of Jan 2018 in full compliance with EU regulations and the IAA’s requirements.”
Explaining the impact for shareholders, Ryanair said the slower rate of growth will slightly reduce traffic this year and next and monthly growth will more than half to 4% from 9% during the period to March. Full year traffic will ‘normalise’ to 129mln from 131mln.
It added that last week’s flight cancellations should cost less than €25mln, it issued free flight vouchers to affected customers at a cost of under €25mln, and it expects lower yields in the coming months due to seat sales promotions.
That being said, Ryanair doesn’t expect to alter its current year profit guidance of €1.40bn to €1.45bn, and it promised a further update for investors when it reports half year results in late October.