April 9, 2024
Birds of a feather flock together. Or at least in this case private jet shuttle operators JetSmarter and Surf Air, both have now made the move to use London City Airport for flights, moving away from Luton Airport. JetSmarter said yesterday “starting January” all JetShuttles under three hours of flight time are moving to LCY. Included are flights to Paris, Geneva (weekly Light Jet), Milan and Nice. Luton will retain shuttles to New York, Moscow and a weekly Heavy Jet to Geneva. Biggin Hill will have a flight to Malaga, Spain.
Last year start-up rival Surf Air had made the same move after initially beginning operations from Luton, Europe’s fourth busiest private jet airport. In both cases, customers will continue to use the FBO for departures and arrivals saving time and hassles of transiting commercial terminals.
Sergey Petrossov, Founder and CEO of JetSmarter, commented in a press release, “With Europe being one of our strongest markets, we are thrilled to be able to offer JETSHUTTLES from London City Airport as part of our plan to invest more time focusing on JetSmarter’s growth within this region. This move once again highlights the need for a more efficient approach to business travel, and we are certain our members will benefit from the wonderful location, transport links, and amenities of London City Airport.”
Surf Air’s website shows its only current active service from the airport is to Zurich. During the summer months, it was operating flights from Luton to Ibiza and Cannes and has said it plans to expand service to other points.
For JetSmarter, it is hoping 2018 will see continued growth without the negative news that surrounded 2017, including the indictment of a former executive, a lawsuit by former employees and complaints by customers about ever-changing terms of service and the inability to get direct answers. Petrossov had told Private Jet Card Comparisons he was improving customer service for the company’s top-tier customers.
