Benefit of doing 7-day different schedule?

[stansu]

I see a lot of experienced players always create one flight number per day, even for non-LH routes.

I can understand the benefit of doing so for LH routes where squeezing in an extra flight can mean 30% more revenue on the a/c. I do that too for LH, and usually it takes 15-20 minutes to create a "perfect" schedule for an a/c on those routes. But what puzzles me is why experienced players are doing this for short-haul routes too where same schedule every day is about as good as optimizing with different schedules per day.

Can anyone care to explain what are all the benefits of doing so? Is it worth it?

Also, despite creating mostly mon-sun schedules, I already spent a huge amount of RL time managing them. So I can't imagine how you could manage 7 times more routes! Any tips or tools do you guys use that can be used to track/create all different schedules per weekday?

Thanks in advance for all the tips!

[ucfknightryan]

personally, I refuse to do 7-day scheduling for domestic/short routes.  It takes an insane amount of time (way more than for long haul) and the benefit is not worth the time investment in almost all cases imo.  And heaven help you if you should have to do fleet replacement on a fleet of aircraft with 14-28 routes scheduled per aircraft...

[swiftus27]

I only seven day on long haul myself

[AndiD]

You basically gain a full plane worth of schedules for 7-10 planes of standard service which have flights overnight (due to A check times) without extra staff overhead. You don't need it if you only fly from 5am to shortly before midnight and have all your A checks from 0am to 5am.

What I've done in the past is a "6 1/2-day schedule" for non-LH planes. You schedule your A checks of - let's say 10 planes - in a way that no flights you skip on one day of the week for A checks overlap with another of those 6-day routes of any other plane. An 11th plane now gets those missing 10 single day routes of the other planes you skipped for A checks, so that in the end you have every route served every day. The more you can utilize this "11th plane" with single-day routes the better.

[swiftus27]

For short haul I first start with the redeye and then fill the gap after with 1 to 2 routes if I can

[Infinity]

I always do 7 day when possible. The result is that my airline is among the top in utilization and I squeeze the most profit out of the aircraft. Long Haul just doesn't work any other way, but I also do it on shorthauls. Although it's always a question of how difficult it is to balance it, if you fly shorthaul out of Tokyo Haneda you have a gazillion of short routes with ultrahigh demand yet almost no longer routes, so you can't fill the nights in a 7 day schedule, which in turn means that 7 day scheduling does not make any sense in Haneda.
Whereas in the US, with all the transcontinental flights, it's easy and makes a lot of sense.

[schro]

I dont' bother with it for short haul. It is simply not worth the extra effort. In general, if I can fly 1x daily on a single frame, then I don't do 7 day. I will do 7 day on anything longer than that (the breakpoint is around 3600nm for widebodies).

I always do 7 day when possible. The result is that my airline is among the top in utilization and I squeeze the most profit out of the aircraft. Long Haul just doesn't work any other way, but I also do it on shorthauls. Although it's always a question of how difficult it is to balance it, if you fly shorthaul out of Tokyo Haneda you have a gazillion of short routes with ultrahigh demand yet almost no longer routes, so you can't fill the nights in a 7 day schedule, which in turn means that 7 day scheduling does not make any sense in Haneda.
Whereas in the US, with all the transcontinental flights, it's easy and makes a lot of sense.

Honestly, utilization does not equal profit, but that is an entirely different thread and argument. Yes, a plane on the ground isn't making money while one in the air is, but utilization statistics are heavily skewed towards longhauler airlines, and given that revenue does not increase linearly with costs, the shorter the flight, the more the profit you can make...

[Cardinal]

It also helps when morning slots (5-8am) are all used up or your base has a ridiculous curfew (like most of Japan), so you have to either fly a lot of redeyes or RON planes at their destinations if redeyes aren't feasible. That would normally mean doing A-checks in the middle of the day, or forgoing the redeye/RON route once a week. 7-day scheduling gets around that, which is why some of us use it even for shorthaul.

Where it really comes in handy is when you're out of shorter routes to fill a gap, all your routes are longer than 6 hours round trip and due to turn times you can't shoehorn 3 of them into one plane's schedule, but the plane sits for 4-5 daylight hours when it could be flying. Using 7-day scheduling (or my own variation, 3+3+1 schedules using 3 planes) to fly 2.5 round-trips a day gets the planes in the air during peak money-making hours.

[FlyTO]

Its good for LH ofcourse, but useful at times with SH too.
If you're in N.A west coast, then it's very useful. Central N.A, not so much. Eastern N.A, a bit useful.
Also as mentioned, airports with curfews make it more feasible to do 7-day schedules, because after a while you run out of routes to fly to cover the red eye portion of the schedule (Depart by 23:00 to Land after 05:00).

[DHillMSP]

Its good for LH ofcourse, but useful at times with SH too.
If you're in N.A west coast, then it's very useful. Central N.A, not so much. Eastern N.A, a bit useful.
Also as mentioned, airports with curfews make it more feasible to do 7-day schedules, because after a while you run out of routes to fly to cover the red eye portion of the schedule (Depart by 23:00 to Land after 05:00).

I generally fly out of MSP and do 7-day across the board with few exceptions. Depending on your fleet mix and the number of slots available at home, it can come in handy. 

[Infinity]

but utilization statistics are heavily skewed towards longhauler airlines

I thought that too, but no. My A320s actually have higher utilization times than my A330s (both types with rather tight 7 day scheduling).

[Sanabas]

I thought that too, but no. My A320s actually have higher utilization times than my A330s (both types with rather tight 7 day scheduling).

An a330 that flies 5 legs/week will have 9 x 130 minute turns, and 1 x 380 minute for the a-check. That's 25 hours, 50 minutes down time per week, gives a utilisation of 20.3 hours/day.

7 legs, 135 minute turns, and it drops to 18.9.

An a320 that flies 14 legs/week will have 27 x 65 minute turns, and 1 x 340 minute for the a-check. That's 34 hours, 55 minutes down time per week, gives a utilisation of 19.0 hours/day.

An a320 that flies 21 legs/week, and uses 70 minutes (1%) rather than 65 (1.4), will have 41 x 70, 1 x 340. 53 hours, 30 minutes on the ground, utilisation is just 16.4 hours.

If your a320s are flying relatively long routes (say 10 x ~2000 NM for the week), you'll have 19 x 65, 1 x 340, utilisation of 20.2 hours.

Either your a320s are flying longer legs and so have less than 10 routes/week, your a330s are flying some shorter legs and so have 7+ routes, your scheduling isn't actually that tight, or some combination of all 3.

Fleet utilisation is absolutely skewed towards longhaul, given the same efficiency in scheduling.

Personally, I use 7 day any time I can't comfortably fit into 24 hour blocks. So that's all long haul, and usually some of the medium length, 10-16 hour round trips. Anything shorter than a 10 hour trip will almost certainly fit nicely into 24 hour blocks, so is only ever part of a 7-day schedule as a filler route. There's literally no benefit in efficiency for using 7-day scheduling for a turboprop averaging 4 legs/day. There can be a benefit to organising the timings of flights, of working around a curfew. But certainly not enough benefit for me to bother with the extra hassle involved.

[Infinity]

Either your a320s are flying longer legs and so have less than 10 routes/week, your a330s are flying some shorter legs and so have 7+ routes, your scheduling isn't actually that tight, or some combination of all 3.

Partly, no, and no. My A320s fly some longer routes, I am based in Asia. Many routes are well over 1,000nm, but I still have 15-20 flights per week on them on average.
My A330s fly mostly around 5,000nm routes, I only squeeze in some intra asian flights to maximize utilization. 5-6 flights per week max, less on the A340 which fly farther.
My scheduling can't be 'not that tight' because I am the top large airline regarding utilization.

Your maths from above, by the way, don't make any practical sense, because there is little chance to really fill the schedule of an aircraft that neatly. There will always be some off-times that are not due to turn or maintenance.
My average utilization is 18.0 hours, and most of my A320s are above that average. Now, in an environment in which there are fewer long short haul routes and 7-day-scheduling is less viable, this will look significantly different.

However, utilization is not skewed to long haul, it is skewed to 7-day-scheduling. Sure, flying more longer routes helps and flying many short routes hurts, but if you have a nice mix like I do, it's not skewed to long haul.

There's literally no benefit in efficiency for using 7-day scheduling for a turboprop averaging 4 legs/day.

That's right. As I said, for 7-day-scheduling to be useful you need to have a nice mix of flight lengths. If there are no longer legs into different time zones that warrant an overnight flight, there is little use for 7-day. As a turboprop can't even fly that far, it's clear that 7-day isn't an option for them.

[Sanabas]

Partly, no, and no. My A320s fly some longer routes, I am based in Asia. Many routes are well over 1,000nm, but I still have 15-20 flights per week on them on average.
My A330s fly mostly around 5,000nm routes, I only squeeze in some intra asian flights to maximize utilization. 5-6 flights per week max, less on the A340 which fly farther.
My scheduling can't be 'not that tight' because I am the top large airline regarding utilization.

If you fly 5 legs on an a340, and your utilisation isn't above 20 hours, then your scheduling is not 'rather tight'. An a320 flying 15-20 flights will have a utilisation in the high 18s at absolute best. 7 tightly scheduled legs on an a330 will give a utilisation just above 19. It might be inevitable from your location to have gaps in the LH schedule, particularly once you start filling up a lot of routes. And same for everyone else, leaving you first of the large airlines. But I stand by what I said. If 15+ legs on an a320 is giving better utilisation that 7 or less legs on an a330, your scheduling isn't that tight.

Your maths from above, by the way, don't make any practical sense, because there is little chance to really fill the schedule of an aircraft that neatly. There will always be some off-times that are not due to turn or maintenance.
My average utilization is 18.0 hours, and most of my A320s are above that average. Now, in an environment in which there are fewer long short haul routes and 7-day-scheduling is less viable, this will look significantly different.

I disagree. There is plenty of chance to really fill a schedule that neatly from most airports. My most recent biggish airline, based in Rome, with a base in Milan, in the current MT, was up to at least 15 groups of 7. None of them wasted more than an hour over the course of the week, and a lot of them wasted no time. My LH utilisation was well over 19 hrs, and I think my overall was around 19.0. It gets harder as you fill your airport, certainly. And it gets harder when all your feasible flights are in one direction. Base in JFK, and almost all you have in the 2500-5500 range flies east, it's ~6000 NM to start reaching asian airports by flying west.

However, utilization is not skewed to long haul, it is skewed to 7-day-scheduling. Sure, flying more longer routes helps and flying many short routes hurts, but if you have a nice mix like I do, it's not skewed to long haul.

No. It's skewed to longer flights. A normal schedule made up of 2 long legs on an a320 will give a utilisation of 19 hours. You've got 18.0 overall with your good mix of flights, but if you didn't have to mix in the short flights, you'd be able to get closer to 19. If you flew only a330/340, you could even be nudging 20. And as you say, if you don't actually have longer flights, you don't need to bother with 7 day schedules.

[ArcherII]

My take is that utilization is not the main objective of a 7-day schedule. A 7-day schedule would enable you to serve locations you wouldn't do with regular scheduling.
Example, there's a city with 150 pax demand 1500nm away, if you make a regular 1234567 route, then when you fill the schedule of your plane, you need to find a suitable <300nm destination to complete another 1234567 in that plane. Given that at that point in the game you are so desperate of serving a 1500nm-150pax route, finding suitable <300nm routes could be impossible.
So a 7-day is the best option sometimes to achieve high destination numbers.

[Aerlingus1916]

I cant be bothered to do this, I also dont have time

[stevecree]

ditto with EI330, except long haul where I can be bothered.

[Aerlingus1916]

Yeah, its pretty much mandatory operations on LH routes.

[knobbygb]

I cant be bothered to do this, I also dont have time

For those of us that are totally addicted and lucky enough to be at home a lot of the time, playing with ultra efficient scheduling, just for the hell of it passes many a happy hour...    Some people do Sudoku, I try to squeeze an extra 5% of efficiency from my overworked 737s. 

Seriously though, as someone else said, it's not just about utilisation, but about being able to serve those "odd" destinations (13hrs or 25hr required time, for example) without being REALLY inefficient.  I think that's why I don't generally do it for short-haul - it's just that most round-trips are a lot shorter then 12hrs anyway.

Depends a lot on where you are in the world as people said.  In Australia, for example, things can get very messy due to the limited destinations.

As for 'very' short haul (turboprops) I do Like AndiD's "six and a half days scheduling" - just use a spare aircraft to fill in the gaps.