Ryanair has said its new ‘Business Plus’ service has helped half-year profits jump 32 per cent to €795 million, with passenger traffic also rising 4 per cent to 51.3 million customers.
The Irish carrier is also targeting an increase in business travellers for next year with its new winter schedule, which it says offers more routes to major European airports.
Ryanair has previously been criticised by parts of the corporate travel industry for not flying to main city airports, however the airline said its winter schedule “offers many more business routes to and from primary airports”.
It also said “price-conscious” firms are helping push their employees onto Ryanair with the help of the Business Plus product.
According to its half year results published yesterday Passenger numbers are expected to rise by 12% in the current quarter and 20% in the last three months of the year, helping it to upgrade its annual profit forecast to €750 million-€770 million, compared with last year’s €523 million.
Ryanair’s CEO Michael O’Leary said: “We are pleased to report this significant increase H1 profits. While partially due to the presence of Easter in Q1 and a weak prior year comparable, we have also enjoyed a strong summer thanks to our strategy, of raising forward bookings and improving our customer experience which has delivered higher load factors and yields.”
Ryanair.com