Does departure time have any impact on my load factor?

[Gretter]

Is there a difference between departing at 3am or 10am? Is it the same for short-haul vs. long-haul?

[Amelie090904]

In general you would want to avoid departures between 00:00 and 04:55 as passengers will try to avoid those times. And yes, it is valid for both short haul and long haul.

[Gretter]

In general you would want to avoid departures between 00:00 and 04:55 as passengers will try to avoid those times. And yes, it is valid for both short haul and long haul.

Thanks Andre. Would that mean that I should start all my flights at 05:00am if possible? And does landing time have an effect too?

[Amelie090904]

Some would argue to begin flying at 06:00, but I usually do it at 05:00 and never noticed much of an effect. Landing also matters, but less than departures. I would still avoid landings at night, but if nothing else works out (e.g. in a 7-day-schedule or for a night flight, a 04:xx landing is acceptable for me personally).

[schro]

Thanks Andre. Would that mean that I should start all my flights at 05:00am if possible? And does landing time have an effect too?

It's more a phase in effect - 06:00-22:55 are the same (for departure/landing). 0500-0555 will improve your ticket sales as the hour progresses, and 2300-2355 will decrease as the hour progresses.

Landing time has an effect and I'd avoid the 0000-0455 time windows for landing. No material difference for short haul vs long haul from what I've seen. If you have a poorly timed departure or landing, you've got to significantly discount the tickets to sell them.

Due to slot constraints, you won't be able to start all your flights at 0500 - you'd need to use all parts of the hour. It's an interesting dilemma on focusing on the 0500 vs 0600 slots first. In theory, you get an extra hour of utilization out of a short haul schedule by departing in the 0500 hour, but in theory, you can sell more tickets than you would have otherwise in the 0500 hour.

[spiff23]

One thing to add is that after you have a long haul route at 100 RI, you can usually open a route that returns to base between 00:00 and 01:00 and it will be full if demand is there. That late return will suffer if competition is tough, but look at the total revenue to see if it's worth keeping...the first leg might do really well as and the return covers costs. It doesn't work well on short haul, but still may be profitable if first leg is full...but long haul international or transcontinental definitely works out ok.