International Business: Airlines struggle with travel recovery – Gulf Digital News

International Business: Airlines struggle with travel recovery – Gulf Digital News

LONDON: Thousands of holidaymakers have seen their Easter getaways disrupted or cancelled because airlines and airports do not have enough staff to meet the recovery in demand as pandemic restrictions are eased in Europe.

High rates of Covid-19 in Britain have caused staff absences for airlines and airports that were already struggling to recruit after workers deserted the industry during the pandemic.

Low-cost carrier easyJet was one of the worst affected, saying it cancelled around 60 UK flights on Tuesday and expected to pull a similar number in the coming days. It cancelled more than 200 at the weekend and another 62 on Monday.

Paul Charles, head of travel consultancy The PC Agency, said it could take at least two or three months to get through a nasty cocktail of staff shortages, Covid illness and a backlog in approving security passes for airport and airline workers.

“It’s ironic that the very desire to get people booking again, post-pandemic, is causing more difficult transport issues than those created by Covid itself,” he said.

EasyJet said it was rostering additional standby crew, but it had cancelled some flights on routes where it runs frequent services so passengers had options to rebook.

British Airways (BA) cancelled 662 flights in