Lufthansa plans compulsory lay-offs as forecasts travel slump to 2024
Lufthansa put German workers on notice of compulsory lay-offs on Thursday, saying tumbling air travel and slow progress in union negotiations meant cuts were unavoidable after it lost 1.7 billion euros ($2 billion) in a single quarter.
The German airline, which secured a 9 billion euro state bailout in June, flew just 4 per cent of prior-year passengers between April and June as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and expects capacity to increase to only around 50 per cent by the end of the year and two-thirds of last year’s level in 2021.
Its outlook is more pessimistic than rivals such as Air France-KLM, which expects to fly 80 per cent of its pre-crisis flights next year, and British Airways and Iberia owner IAG , which forecasts capacity to be 24 per cent lower in 2021.
