Durham Tees Valley Wins Court of Appeal Case Against bmibaby

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  • Anonymous
    Guest

    continentalclub
    Participant

    Although there are much bigger aviation stories at present, this case has been rumbling on for some years now. To over-simplify, the owners of Durham Tees Valley signed a commercial contract with bmibaby, the terms of which provided for ten years of operations by the latter at MME.

    Two years in and bmibaby walked away. The airport owners, Peel Holdings, took bmibaby to the High Court in 2009, and while they were unsuccessful in winning their case, they were granted leave to appeal.

    Peel were, I think, particularly miffed with bmi that part of the undertaking on the former’s part was to change the airport’s name from Tees-side to Durham Tees Valley; a move that was not universally popular in the airport’s catchment area (to understate the situation slightly). Having gone through the pain and cost of re-branding, bmibaby flew the nest.

    The Court of Appeal ruled yesterday that ‘bmibaby were clearly in breach of contract in withdrawing all services only two years into a ten year agreement and as such damages should be awarded to the Airport Company’.

    The Court have indicated that the measure of damages should be the money the Airport would have received had the airline remained and operated its normal services for the remaining eight years of the contract.

    If the parties now can’t agree on the level of damages bmibaby must pay to the Airport, the Court will determine the sum itself in a further hearing.

    It’s arguably the first bit of good news that MME has had in recent years, as they were also left high and dry by bmi mainline withdrawing the decades-old Heathrow link in 2009.

    http://bit.ly/cHFHvr


    VintageKrug
    Participant

    Will Durham ever get this service back, I wonder?


    continentalclub
    Participant

    Unfortunately, the omens are not good, VK.

    bmi manipulated the revenue management of the LHR-MME link to such an extent in later years that many did begin to wonder if they believed their own rhetoric on the poor performace of the route.

    Tragically, that data is now presumably washing around Lufthansa and infecting their perception of the demand that exists within the North East – not only for a Heathrow connection but for ones to FRA, ZRH etc. Even NCL receives only an extremely thin DUS route from LH.

    And yet, simultaneously, EK have established a well-patronised route to Dubai from NCL and KL have increased frequencies and capacity from MME, whilst maintaing levels of service just up the road on Tyneside.

    BD was an excellent operator on the (then) Tees-side to London route for many, many years, and developed huge affection and loyalty. Ironically, at a time when *A is seeking to bolster its presence at Heathrow, it’s the case that a significant UK region suffers from the worst *A connectivity that it has ever known.

    It’s also ironic that the MME route (and that from LBA) was sacrificed at the very time that *A carriers, including BD, were lobbying for and attempting to justify R3 in West London.


    PaulJennings
    Participant

    About time that these no-frills no-responsibility airlines were held to the terms of the contracts that they go into.

    Good points CC; I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that bmi’s figures were more cooked than an Icelandic steak.

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