Minor changes to Air New Zealand’s schedule could cause major issues for local travellers. A reduction in daily flights between Rotorua and Wellington has ruffled some feathers, however new overnight flights will improve connections with Auckland.
Changes to the domestic and regional schedule have been instigated by lower demand, particularly among corporate and government customers, the airline’s Scott Carr advises.
“Like other airlines in Aotearoa, our domestic business continues to be impacted by challenging conditions, including high operating costs and soft domestic demand,” he said.
“As a result, we’ve made some changes to our services in the areas where we are seeing the most impact from less flying. We understand these changes will affect some of our customers’ upcoming travel plans and as always, we’ll work with everyone impacted to rebook their travel.”
The changes, which impact other routes as well, will be applied between February and June, resulting in a two per cent reduction in the number of seats overall. Carr confirms services may resume following a mid-year review.
“These reductions not only allow us to more appropriately respond to the level of demand we are experiencing, but they also give the airline a small amount of resilience to improve recovery options in the event of a flight disruption on our regional network. We will continue to monitor domestic demand and will review the schedule from July onwards closer to the time.”
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