European budget airline Wizz Air says its operations have “normalised” in the past few months after suffering disruption in the earlier part of the year.
The Hungary-based company, which is one of the continent’s fastest growing airlines, said it had delivered “strong results” for its second quarter between July and September after enduring a “difficult first quarter operationally". These problems forced Wizz to cut back its planned capacity for this summer.
Jozsef Varadi, Wizz Air’s CEO, added: “Much has been done within the aviation industry to address the significant issues that were a feature early in the 2022 calendar year.
“As a consequence, our operational performance has recently normalised and we are now back in line with our historically low levels of cancellations and flight disruptions.”
During the six months from April to September, Wizz Air increased passenger numbers by 112 per cent to 26.5 million, with revenue rising by 149 per cent year-on-year to €2.2 billion.
But despite this rise in revenue, the airline still recorded an operating loss of €63.8 million during the half-year period, as Wizz faced higher fuel prices and the costs associated with rapidly increasing its capacity and staffing levels.
Varadi said that revenue in the six months was 31 per cent higher than during the same period pre-Covid, with higher load factors and yields “no longer held back by Covid-19 or the war in Ukraine”.
Wizz’s average ticket revenue rose to €44.60 per passenger, which was 3.1 per cent higher than in 2019, while ancillary revenue reached €38.20 per passenger, an increase of 18.3 per cent on pre-Covid figures.
The airline is currently planning to operate 35 per cent more capacity for the winter period from October to March 2023 compared to 2019/2020.
“Our diversification strategy into the Gulf will also see more inbound and outbound routes to the Middle East and we are expecting moderate counter-seasonal contribution in terms of traffic and revenues from these destinations,” added Varadi.
“While the macroeconomic backdrop remains challenging and uncertainty for consumers has heightened, we have put in place measures to mitigate the impact on our costs.”