Vueling Airlines
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Vueling Airlines is a low-fare airline based in Barcelona, Spain. It links to many destinations in Europe and also the western Mediterranean. Its main base is Barcelona Airport, with additional hubs at Valencia Airport and Madrid Airport.
History
The airline was established in 2004 and started operations on 1 July 2004. It is owned by Apax Partners (39%), Inversiones Hemisferio (Grupo Planeta) (30%), management team (23%) and private investors (7%).
On 1 March 2005 it was announced that International Lease Finance Corporation (ILFC) had placed six new Airbus A320 aircraft on six year lease terms with Vueling Airlines, for delivery between April and December 2006.
Destinations
Vueling Airlines operates the following services (at October 2005):
- Domestic scheduled destinations: Alicante, Barcelona, Bilbao, Granada, Madrid, Palma de Mallorca, Menorca, Málaga, Ibiza, Santiago de Compostela, Seville and Valencia.
- International scheduled destinations: Amsterdam, Brussels, Milan, Lisbon, Paris, Rome and Venice. Athens will be operated in the near future.
Fleet
The Vueling Airlines fleet consists of 12 Airbus A320-200 aircraft (at June 2006).
In March 2006, the average age of Vueling fleet is 1.4 years old.
Particularities
- Vueling flies only to the main airports of the cities it has activity in.
- Provides no free catering services, as commonly seen in low cost companies. Nevertheless, food and drink can be bought at prices normally inferior to those found in other low cost companies.
- Vueling seeks to clearly differentiate itself from the "Low Cost" phenomenon. It claims it is a "New Generation Airline".
- Unlike most other low cost companies, Vueling assigns fix sits to its passengers. Its modern booking system even allows to choose a determinate sit while buying the ticket through the Internet. No additional taxes are retrieved for using a credit card.
- It allows on-line check-in, the passenger prints its own ticket. The first Spanish airline to do so.
- It was chosen the second best new airline of 2005, only surpassed by Air Berlin.
- In December of 2005 it signed a contract with Amadeus to publish its flies in its GDS. This agreement allows traditional travel agencies to sell Vueling tickets. The prices seen using this method are generally higher than on-line ones.
External links
- [Vueling Airlines]
- [Vueling Airlines Fleet Age]
- [Vueling Airlines Fleet Detail]
- [Vueling Airlines Passenger Opinions]
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