British Airways has doubled down on its policy of cancelling services this summer as it seeks to avoid the cancellations and last-minute disruptions that have plagued the industry. Data shows that the IAG-owned carrier has this week alone cut 1,254 one-way flights from its July schedule, or 214,000 seats. This amounts to a 6.2% reduction in its total flights for the month compared with last week, and a 5.3% drop in seats. This comes on top of the roughly 16,000 services it has already cut from its summer schedule. In total, the carrier will now operate 18,952 services in July – a rise of 166% on last year – and 2.4 million seats. Swathes of the airline's short-haul network will be impacted by the latest cuts, with particularly large reductions for some destinations. Faro in Portugal, for example, will have a third fewer flights while Bordeaux and Verona each lose a quarter, Cirium's data shows. Other destinations impacted include Amsterdam and Alicante, each of which lose around a fifth of scheduled BA services. "We took pre-emptive action earlier this year to reduce our summer schedule to provide customers with as much notice as possible about any changes to their travel plans," says the carrier. "As the entire aviation industry continues to face into the most challenging period in its history, regrettably it has become necessary to make some further reductions. We're in touch with customers to apologise and offer to rebook them or issue a full refund."

Ryanair has sealed a deal with union BALPA that will bring full pay restoration for the airline's UK pilots. The agreement will come into force having been approved by BALPA members in a ballot. "While the recovery from the impact of the pandemic is still ongoing and our industry faces significant challenges, this long-term agreement delivers stability, accelerated pay restoration, future pay increases and other benefit improvements for our UK pilots," states Ryanair's people director Darrell Hughes. All of Ryanair's European pilots are covered as a minimum by emergency agreements reached in 2020, but the company is now seeking to update this through deals with unions. So far, it has renegotiated agreements with 70% of its pilots. These will run into 2026 or 2027. As part of its plan to operate at 115% of its pre-Covid capacity this year, Ryanair says it is prioritising early restoration of pay through renegotiated agreements, to enable growth.

Negotiations between Scandinavian airline group SAS and pilot representatives have been extended by three days to 2 July as mediators try to seal a last-minute deal to avoid strikes. Over 1,000 SAS pilots are threatening industrial action at the peak of the summer flying season, in the latest blow to the group. This follows the failure to agree a replacement to a collective labour agreement which expired on 1 April. "SAS welcomes the mediators' decision as it continues to be the company's firm ambition to reach an agreement and avoid a strike," it states. Unions are concerned that instead of reinstating pilots laid off amid the pandemic, SAS is seeking to hire foreign staff into its new SAS Connect and SAS Link units on lower pay rates. They accuse SAS of creating these new divisions solely to circumnavigate labour agreements. The airline laid off 560 pilots during the crisis. They were granted the right to reinstatement within five years ahead of SAS hiring new pilots. SAS has struggled to regain its footing as it emerges from the crisis and has been contemplating a Chapter 11 filing in the USA as one possible avenue to reorganise its balance sheet and restructure its debt, sources told Cirium earlier this month. The Scandinavian airline group has, Cirium understands, hired Seabury Securities as a strategic adviser to assess how it can reduce its costs and liabilities, and a Chapter 11 filing is one option being tabled. "SAS is in big financial trouble, and employees cannot save the company alone," Henrik Thyregod, chairman of the Danish Pilots Association, recently told Cirium. "The sense is that even if the pilots flew for free for SAS, it is not enough."