Making looses but all routes profitable?

[Colsie123]

Hi ya guys,

First time posting so hey! Great wee simulation you have going on here. That to side, I have a question and wonder if anyone could give a wee hand please.

I have just started my airline it is in it's 3rd week of trading with 2 aircraft (3rd on its way). The fleet is made up of one A320 (european short haul) and one ATR 42 (UK domestic and trips over the channel). Anyway I am making massive looses although all my routes and aircraft are running at a profit, although flights yield only around 50-60% passenger volume (I am putting that down to image and pricing).

Currently the figures at the end of last week were:

Income:    626 100 USD

Total expenses: -1 349 509 USD

So that results in a loss of course of:

-727 801 USD

I return a loan amount of 4392 per week.

At the beginning of the new week I am making a small profit of 27904 from an income of 74125 with expenses of 41829 plus loan amount of 4392.

The problem is the above figures have not deducted aircraft maintenance, leases, wages and training yet which makes up a bulk of my expenditure.

I was wondering if anyone had any advice on how I can control the costs which are variables. I have reduced marketing as much as possible, reduced staff wages as much as they will tolerate without delaying aircraft and stopped expansion of the network (besides the routes already purchased for the new aircraft arriving).

Thanks,

Colsie123

[Sami]

Pls post screenshot of the income statement.


Also, route view includes only costs that are directly associated with that route. Not general costs like staff and marketing.

[Shieldstoni]

Ok areas you need to play close attention to are:

Fleet utilisation - how many hours of
Flying a day does each a/c do? It's not making money sat on the ground.

Scheduling: passenger prefer flights departing after 05:00 that land before 23:00 so assign these time frames to
Your most important routes, fly a route with a
Lower demand but still enough to fill 80% capacity and it will still turn a profit.

Staffing/pricing - you are a brand new airline! There is no
Need for to be meddling with your staff/salaries/route pricing. I suggest you do the
Following immediately!

Reset your route prices to suggested default prices from pricing management page and do this every 3 real days or
So to keep them in check

Immediately change to automatic staff management which will reset salaries - the minute
You cut staff salary you are in a downward spiral unless you act right away as morale will nosedive, flights will cancel due to strikes etc etc


Marketing - you don't need global campaigns just yet, but you should run at least 1 general campaign uk wide perhaps billboard, nothing more, and have route adverts for all routes at billboard/newspaper level, you have to spend to make money and your CI will increase quickly and the pax will come flocking.

Let us know if this works, it should!

[Colsie123]

Hi ya guys,

I will get screens up as soon as I remember where my mac saves the screenshots to.

I had to delcare my last airline bankrupt as we had built up just far too much debt to be able to cope with it. So I have started a new airline and still have some of the same issues (but this time on a controllable scale). I have leased only one aircraft A322 operating London Gatwick-Moscow. The flight scheduele for the craft is as follows:

5:05-11:15 EGKK-UUWW
12:45-13:55 UUWW-EGKK

14:55-21:55 EGKK-UUWW
22:35-23:45 UUWW-EGKK

That is 7 days awake (the evening flights do not operate on Saturday as A maintenance is done Sunday at midnight).

The flight is using default pricing witht he only addition or change being made  to the cabin as there was demand for business customers.

My load factors are 43.7% in Y and 34.4 in C. So clearly room for improvement there.

At the minute with this airline I have only seen weekly budgets (as not completed a full game week) but I am fluctuating in and out of profit.

On the load factors above though I have made 274536 USD and expenses of 259317 USD.

My worry is that is before my big expense the lease comes off the account and of course other fees change as they go. I will get these screenshots up ASAP though.

And thanks for the help with this guys.

[Shieldstoni]

But what you have to remember is that this is a brand new airline. What is the daily pax demand on this
Route? It needs to be at least 250-260 per day in economy and at least 20 or so business class.

Also remember that you are unknown, over time you will get load factors of 60% plus will will be your break even point and you will start to actually make a healthy profit. You MUST have an active route
for this route, I'd suggest no more or less than billboards as you are small and this will increase CI which in turn will up your LF %.

If there is not enough demand for double daily on this route then change the later flight to another European capital. You still also have over 5 hours downtime each night, apart from the day you have your A check, why not open AMS or MAN or BRU 6 weekly? You should be able to do so and still make profit.

Let us know how it goes, but give it time, you're quitting too quick. When you can afford it add another A320 and look to fit in 3 different routes daily, perhaps FRA/CDG/AGP or DUB and you will start earning ££££'s

[Colsie123]

Hi guys,

Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I thought I had everything under control apparently not. I have been making massive losses over the past few weeks-one week simply due to C check required on aircraft however the rest I cant figure out.

I have uploaded everything I think would be relevant to see if anyone could give me any advice.

Thanks guys,

Colsie123
























Thanks for any help you can give guys.

[JumboShrimp]

4 fleet types with 5 aircraft is not a good idea.  You pretty much have 1.25 aircraft to support the fleet costs.  That's not enough.  You should try to limit yourself to 1 or 2 fleet types when you start, maybe adding 3rd when you have some 20+ aircraft (to accelerate your growth).  Don't go beyond 3 fleet types.

Your A300 is landing in the middle of the night, which is reducing your Load Factors significantly.

Since you are in a hole and I don't see any magic bullet to get out of it quickly, I would just re-start, and with the new airline, try to pick a good fleet, and try to get as many aircraft in that fleet before you add another one.