Flyadeal’s Formula for On-Time Performance Success
‘Weather gods’ aside, Flyadeal chief Steven Greenway explains how the carrier became one of the world’s most on-time in Cirium’s On-Time Performance Report for June
Steven Greenway, Chief Executive of Saudi Arabian low-cost carrier Flyadeal, is in a buoyant mood after the airline he leads topped the list of on-time performers in the Middle East & Africa region in Cirium’s OTP Monthly Report for June.
With 91.77% of its flights arriving on time in June, Flyadeal performed better than its parent company Saudia, which itself had a 91.33% on-time arrival rate and came first for on-time performance among global airlines during that month.
While he gives thanks to the “weather gods” that spared the two airlines from the typhoons and thunderstorms that plagued the operations of carriers in other parts of the world last month, Greenway attributes Flyadeal’s impressive on-time performance to various steps taken by the airline that are under its control.
These include closing the boarding process 30 minutes prior to departure – versus a 15–20-minute cut-off at other airlines – installing extra-large overhead bins across its all-Airbus fleet, to prevent passengers from “scrabbling” to find space for their bags, and investing heavily in “non-sexy” backend processes such as building a new integrated operations control centre (IOCC).
“The weather [in Saudi Arabia] up until this time of year is fairly benign, so I have to give some credit to the weather gods,” says Greenway in an interview with Cirium. “That does help us, and I have to acknowledge that to a certain degree.”
Weather aside, however, and it becomes apparent that Flyadeal has put a number of extra measures in place to ensure its passengers arrive at their destinations on time.
“We do some things that aren’t sexy that people really don’t talk about,” explains Greenway. “As an example, we close our boarding process 30 minutes prior to departure. We’re the only airline in the Kingdom that has a 30-minute cut-off.”
He admits that “people tended not to like that at the start”, but credits good communications for bringing passengers on board with the idea.
“Our communication with everyone, particularly texts, our mobile app and email, is very clear and so people don’t even talk about it these days,” says Greenway. “Rather than just saying, ‘boarding will close 30 minutes prior to departure’, we were telling them why. We were linking it to our OTP story and saying, ‘we want 90%-plus of our flights to depart on time and for us to do that, we’re doing all of these things’.”
Flyadeal’s modern all-Airbus fleet also contributes to the smooth-running of the airline, he notes, because “if we have any operational issues, we can swap in and out very easily”. The carrier recently took delivery of its 29th A320neo, which it operates alongside 11 A320ceos. It intends to operate more than 100 aircraft by 2030, including A330 widebodies.
“We’ve really, over the past two years, worked at making sure that we are a well-oiled machine,” says Greenway. To sum up: “It’s a weather thing, which I have to acknowledge, there’s some basic things that do make a substantial difference – boarding and overhead bins are two good examples – and then all the way through, we are investing heavily in our backend in terms of our technological prowess.”
Looking ahead, Greenway is eager to sustain Flyadeal’s strong on-time record and maintain its position as a top on-time performer.
“I think it’s difficult to improve on where we’re at because we’re at the top of the rankings anyway, but I’m always mindful of keeping the show going,” he says. “The challenge over the coming years is that as the fleet ages, we’ll need to keep on top of proactive maintenance – so, identifying bumps and snags and being able to deal with those very quickly.”
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