Guernsey Airport made nearly a million pounds through its car park charges last year.
The figure has been revealed through the answers to a number of ‘Rule 14’ questions asked by Deputy Simon Vermeulen.
The politician put the States Trading and Supervisory Board (STSB) on the spot with a number of questions relating to its charges and costs.
Some of Deputy Vermeulen’s questions also related to Aurigny’s finances, with the airline answerable to STSB as its shareholder.
Deputy Vermeulen’s questions focused on the number of overtime hours for airport staff and the associated costs, clarity surrounding lost luggage incidents, the use of wet leases by Aurigny, (and the cost of these leases), and Aurigny’s financial position.
He also asked if the increase in parking fees at the airport had resulted in higher revenue, and how much Aurigny had compensated passengers for cancelled flights, lost luggage, and hotel accommodation.
So what do the stats say?
STSB said Guernsey Airport recorded 7,856 hours of staff overtime – worth £334,105 – due to late openings last year.
“The extension fees charged by the Airport to carriers covered these costs,” said STSB.
With cases of lost luggage, Aurigny reported handling over 260,000 checked-in bags, with only 71 mishandled. That equated a mishandling rate of 0.27 per 1,000 bags. STSB said this is “significantly lower than the global average”.
Guernsey Airport’s car park saw an increased amount of revenue last year, compared to previous years.
STSB says that in 2024 the car park income at the airport increased by 24% but didn’t put a financial number on it.
We know that in 2022, Guernsey Airport made £822,000 in parking charges. In 2023 it was announced that new parking tariffs would come into force in October. At the time Guernsey Ports said that could increase the car park income to more than £1 million.
The answers provided by STSB to Deputy Vermeulen don’t provide an exact figure, but if the sums add up, that means last year the Guernsey Airport car park made £986,400, falling just short of the predicted seven figure sum.
In terms of fleet management, STSB supported Aurigny’s decision to focus on ATRs, even on the back of the airline needing to rely on multiple wet-lease operators throughout 2024.
STSB said this cost less than the £10 million that would have been spent maintaining Aurigny’s Embraer Jet.
However, STSB hasn’t made clear how close to that figure the wet lease charges were, but we can expect more details to be confirmed when Aurigny’s 2024 financial statements are released.
We do know that initially, according to STSB, Aurigny had planned to use a single UK-registered wet-lease operator for 10 months, but this operator failed to meet its contracted capacity. As a result, six additional wet-lease operators were contracted throughout the year, with two of these services terminated due to operational issues.
While Aurigny’s 2024 financial results will show a loss due to exceptional costs, STSB said the airline’s underlying performance remains positive, with a break-even result expected without those additional costs.
The airline’s transition to an all-ATR fleet caused significant disruption, but STSB said improvements in punctuality and passenger numbers were noted following the completion of the fleet transition in December.
STSB’s president, Deputy Peter Roffey said: “The review found no evidence of negligence or gross misjudgement by management. The airline was struck with a series of significant events that were quite unfortunate, but not reasonably foreseeable.
“Whilst I appreciate that it will be of no comfort to those passengers affected by the disruption, it should be noted that Aurigny’s punctuality rates have returned to their historically good levels since the fleet transition was completed upon the arrival of its final ATR aircraft in December (adjusted for weather disruption outside of the airline’s control). Notwithstanding the challenges it experienced last year, it also carried slightly more passengers than it did in 2023.”