neflyer13

Dear all,

As far as I read it for the aircraft on the Athens-Paros route Aegean gold can have guaranteed seat availability 96 hours out. However whenever I call for this benefit the usually helpful phone agents don’t seem to know what I am
talking about and offer wait lists or nothing. Am I missing something—I know this benefit is in applicable some months for small aircraft but it appears Paros ones are large enough to qualify. Grateful for any insights or key words to
mouth…

Knobbgb

I thought that 'benefit' had quietly gone away. I heard of a few people trying to use it but never heard of it actually working and I assumed they'd dropped it. I remember a VERY old thread where a poster said they had called in to clarify and been told the guarantted seat was only available if there were empty seats on the flight. Some benefit then! As for the aircraft on ATH-PAS - they are ATR so pretty much the SMALLEST available (well, they are usually ATR72 and they have ATR 42 but...)

EDIT: Yes it's still there. 96 hours is required for ATR but June to September is excluded, so you've no chance. It's worrying though that the agents don't even know about it!

Arrivals

Haha! If that was true.. Is PAS one of those obligatory flights (forgot the term), subsidized by the Greek state or any longer since the building of the new airport (co-financed by A3)? I would imagine the benefit not being applicable to such routes either, e.g. Karpathos, Kastelorizo.

neflyer13

Weird—the language on the website says the following: “Guaranteed bookingBenefit of a guaranteed Economy Class cabin seat for AEGEAN and Olympic Air flights. Prerequisite is that your reservation is completed at least 48 hours prior to departure for flights operated by an Airbus aircraft type or at least 96 hours before departure for flights operated by DASH 8 100 (37 seats), Dash 8 Q400 (78 seats), or ATR (48 seats. Flights operated by DASH 8 100 (37 seats) or by ATR (48 seats) are excluded from the guaranteed booking benefit, during the period 1 June-30 September.” But Paros flights are certainly more than the 37 and 48 seat planes excluded…

irishguy28

Yes, ATH-PAS-ATH is one of 28 Greek PSO (Public Service Obligation) routes. 175,254 pax were carried on the route in 2018, well above the minimum mandated number of 20,880. Of all the 176 PSO routes in the EU as of 18/9/2019 (the most recent data I could find), it was far and away the most oversubscribed (8.4 times more pax than the minimum required PSO offering), with other Greek routes such as ATH-MLO-ATH, ATH-JNX-ATH, ATH-AOK-ATH, ATH-JIK-ATH, ATH-JSI-ATH and ATH-ZTH-ATH all carrying multiples of their minimum PSO required levels.

Knobbgb

I think it's just a case of the rules not catching up with reality. Before the new airport opened we didn't even get daily flights in the winter and then that quickly ballooned to seven or eight Q400s in summer and still usually two per day in winter - with both Olympic and Sky Express operating at least one daily flight. It really did need to be a PSO route back in the day as it was pretty essential and there's no way it could have been profitable on a DHC8-100 (37 seats). I've been on those flights with as few as three or four people on several occasions. Now, it seems to make money even at the quietest times of year, hence the competition, so it probably no longer needs to be subsidised.

In summer, I believe (only guessing though) that Paros probably has the highest load factor in the OA, and maybe A3 system. I reckon they could easily sell at least TWICE the number of seats that are available. Some flights are full months in advance and they often add extra flights proactively when this is the case. For example, tomorrow (Thursday 4th) there are NINE OA flights PAS-ATH (and FOUR with GQ). Seven of the OA are totally full already and EVERY seat is taken on every flight Friday, Saturday and Sunday (both airlines). In fact, the next seat available on a Saturday or Sunday is... 3rd September - a whole month away!