The Commission has made a decision: airlines will be able to continue to derogate from the European regulation on airport slots during the 2020/2021 winter season, i.e. until 27 March, Commissioner for Transport Adina Vălean announced on Monday 14 September.
The regulation in question, known as the ‘use-it-or-lose-it rule’, requires airlines to make use of at least 80% of their slots at European airports. Otherwise, these slots will be allocated to a competitor for the following season.
However, as the Covid-19 pandemic has considerably reduced air traffic, they have been allowed to temporarily derogate from this regulation since last March (see EUROPE 12456/17) and they can return unused slots without risk of losing access to them.
Slow return to normal
On the basis of a report published by the Commission on Monday (https://bit.ly/35BBizC ), Mrs Vălean considered that air traffic levels will remain too low to allow airlines to plan their slots reliably, and that the conditions for extending the derogation have therefore been met.
Air traffic in the European Economic Area (EEA) was down by 89% in April, at the height of the crisis, and was still down 47% in mid-August compared to the same period in 2019, the report details.
“The trend of resurging cases and the need to maintain sanitary containment measures suggest that air traffic will not reach 2019 levels soon”, it says.
Air traffic levels should, at best, recover to reach a decrease of -15% in February 2021 compared to February 2020, according to Eurocontrol. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) predicts that a return to pre-Covid levels will not occur until 2024.
Shortcomings
In its report, the Commission also identified some of the shortcomings linked to the temporary suspension of the regulation.
In particular, too many airlines (34% in mid-June) continue to cancel and surrender their slots too late, causing problems for airports and service providers and making it more difficult and costly to plan operations.
There is also a risk that some airlines, during the 2020/2021 winter scheduling season, may take advantage of the extension of the derogation to apply for more slots in order to build up a larger portfolio. This could prevent other companies from entering the market and distort competition.
To address these issues, airport representatives, airlines, and slot coordinators agreed last week on a set of conditions to be met if the derogation is extended (see EUROPE 12553/4).
An agreement, welcomed by Adina Vălean on Monday, which has certainly facilitated the Commission’s decision on this extension (see EUROPE 12515/5).
Specific conditions
To safeguard competition, for example, it was agreed that new slots reserved by airlines for the 2020/2021 winter season - in addition to their ‘historical’ slots acquired the previous season - would not benefit from the derogation.
These newly allocated slots will therefore have to be operated 80% of the time or more this winter if the airlines do not want to lose them.
Slots surrendered late, i.e. less than three weeks before their operational date, will only be eligible for the derogation if the circumstances of surrender are beyond the airline’s control. For example, when a government imposes quarantine requirements on travellers arriving from abroad on very short notice, as was the case this summer between the United Kingdom and Spain.
The three-week period therefore remains the general rule, but it will now be up to the slot coordinator at a given airport to decide whether there is a legitimate reason for a late surrender. Otherwise, the slot will be considered unused and therefore lost.
“Now is also the time to start thinking about how to return to a normal slot regime once air traffic returns to more stable levels. The Commission is currently consulting the public and stakeholders on this initiative”, the Commissioner concluded, announcing a possible proposal on this issue by the end of the year. (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)