Japan Airlines (JAL) is cutting flights to London Heathrow this summer. The carrier's Tokyo-London service is a casualty of a new management plan to concentrate on more profitable routes.
As a result JAL says the London-Tokyo service will be halved from two flights to a single daily service operated by a B777 twin jet. At the same time the daily Osaka service will change from a B747 to a B777.
The more fuel-efficient B777s will also replace B747s on flights between Amsterdam, Paris CDG and Tokyo in September and October.
Passengers will find JAL's latest lie-flat style seats installed on these B777s and the carrier says that route frequencies will be revised in a year's time.
In the past the UK-Japan routes were money-spinners. But the Japanese economic slowdown and, one suspects, fierce price competition on a route where airlines used never to offer decent discounts, has dented JAL's earnings.
There are regular economy class seat sales while indirect carriers are luring away business travellers with keen pricing. For example, when Business Traveller checked the cost of a return London-Tokyo business class ticket for the week commencing February 20 with agent Airline Network we were quoted rates of between £1,825 and £2,380 with leading carriers like Air France, KLM, Lufthansa and SAS. This is roughly 50% less than the fares charged by the direct flight carriers such as British Airways, JAL, ANA and Virgin Atlantic.
In other news, JAL has exchanged a memorandum of understanding with the Oneworld alliance (whose members include British Airways, American, Qantas and Cathay Pacific). If all goes according to plan, JAL will fly as a Oneworld member in a year's time.
Meanwhile, JAL continues to be affected by fuel rationing at Heathrow (following last December's Buncefield terminal blaze). Flight JL404 to Tokyo at 21.00 is cancelled on a number of days during February. Flight JL402 at 19.00 remains unaffected.
For more information go to www.uk.jal.com
Report by Alex McWhirter
