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Gulf Air posts 6% revenue growth in H1

Gulf Air, the national carrier of the Kingdom of Bahrain, on Monday announced that it recorded six per cent increase in revenue and 13 per cent growth in passenger numbers during the first half of 2012 compared to the same period last year.

In a statement, the Manama-based airline said its seat load factor has reached 77 per cent during January-June 2012 period, registering a five per cent growth over corresponding first half last year.

The airline’s Falcon Gold premium class alone has seen a healthy 35 per cent growth while economy class has seen 12 per cent growth over the same period last year indicating the passengers increasing preference to fly with Gulf Air due to several new features and facilities introduced recently.

Gulf Air currently operates one of the youngest fleets in the region with an average fleet age of just 4.7 years. The airline’s on-time punctuality has grown to 79 per cent as against 78 per cent in 2011 and 74 per cent in 2010 while its technical dispatch reliability has reached 99.4 per cent.

Correspondingly, customer complaints have reduced by 11 per cent. The introduction of the staff appreciation scheme last year has received much appreciation from customers with over 2,000 frequent flyers complimenting the airline’s customer service.

“We were able to achieve these results with the combined efforts of rationalised route network, fleet optimisation, improved sales efficiency, products and services, cost efficiency measures and expenditure reduction,” Samer Majali, chief executive of Gulf Air, said.

“We are pushing forward with our cost-efficiency and sales efficiency measures in 2012 and are targeting a further 15 per cent reduction in its cost base for the full year; we have already achieved a cost base savings of BD6.8 million between Jan and May this year,” he added.

muzaffarrizvi@khaleejtimes.com