Lufthansa mainline has agreed the term of a new collective labour agreement (CLA) with the German UFO union representing cabin crews, governing pay and conditions until at least the end of 2026. Under the CLA, Lufthansa’s roughly 19,000 cabin crew will receive “substantial” wage increases over the next three years, including extra compensation to account for inflation and a holiday pay supplement. This amounts to wage hikes of 16.5% – rising to 17.4% with interest – in several steps over three years. "Our goal has always been to find a solution at the negotiating table together with the union. We have now succeeded in doing so,” states Michael Niggemann, head of human resources at Lufthansa. “At the same time, the agreed salary developments in all professional groups are also an economic challenge that we now have to deal with." The UFO union says that the terms of the agreement include payment of an inflation compensation bonus of €3,000 ($3,200) for some staff, bonus increases for senior flight attendants and an increase in the supplement to holiday pay. It says it will now put the terms of the agreement to its members in a ballot. Harry Jaeger, head of collective bargaining policy and chief negotiator at UFO, notes that the agreement comes following industrial action by its members. "We fought hard to push through this comprehensive compensation package. Unfortunately, despite all de-escalating efforts, it was not possible to prevent industrial action in order to convince Lufthansa of the seriousness of our demands," he says. "However, we can now be very satisfied with the result. A longer term has given us leeway for more attractive conditions and at the same time offers not only our colleagues reliable planning for the next two and a half years, but also Lufthansa," Jaeger adds. He says that the union now has another collective bargaining agreement to renegotiate with the airline group, which is die for renegotiation at the end of the year. "The colleagues of the two Lufthansa subsidiaries have fought to make their legitimate demands heard. Even though we are not yet able to announce a collective bargaining result, we are confident that we will soon be able to find good solutions here as well. At Lufthansa CityLine, we have now returned to the tariff table in order to achieve a similarly comprehensive package for our colleagues as for the Lufthansa cabin," explains Sara Grubisic, chief tariff officer at UFO.

Delta Air Lines made an operating profit of $614 million in the first quarter of 2024, reversing its loss of $277 million in the same period last year. The US major notes that "robust demand" improved its domestic results, adding that it achieved a company record for domestic unit revenue, which grew 3% year on year. Domestic revenue totalled $8 billion, up 5% year on year. The Atlanta-based carrier expects the revenue trend to continue in the second quarter amid a normalisation of its capacity and fleet management. "Coming out of Covid we had to allocate the resources that we had available," Delta president Glen Hauenstein said on 10 April during an earnings call. He adds: "[These were] once-in-a-lifetime opportunities to take leading positions in places like Boston and Los Angeles at the expense of rebuilding our core hubs. And we're still not done building our core hubs. And so our ability now to go back and to put seats back into our core, where our cost structure is most advantaged and where our profitability is highest, is where we're focused for the rest of this year." Delta's core domestic hubs include Atlanta, Detroit, Minneapolis/St Paul, New York JFK and LaGuardia, Salt Lake City and Seattle. The carrier generated $13.7 billion in first-quarter operating revenue, up 8% year on year. Operating expenses rose 1%, to $13.1 billion. Delta raised capacity 7%, while its load factor increased by two percentage points to 83%. It ended the first quarter with liquidity of $7.4 billion and an adjusted net debt of $20.2 billion.

Ryanair will serve Copenhagen in Denmark, Fuerteventura in Spain, Marrakesh in Morocco, Prague in the Czech Republic, Sofia in Bulgaria, and Tirana in Albania from Bristol as a part of its summer schedule, bringing the total number of routes to 36. The Irish budget carrier says the expansion is supported by the deployment of the airline's five Bristol-based aircraft, representing a $500 million investment in Bristol. The move will help support over 1,400 local jobs, including 150 pilot, cabin crew and engineer jobs.