Iceland’s Keflavik International Airport sees record-breaking passenger increase for 2012

Guðný Jóhannsdóttir, Business and Route Development Manager at Keflavik International Airport (KEF), has announced that 2012 has been a successful and record-breaking year for the airport in Iceland.

According to Jóhannsdóttir, KEF saw a record-breaking increase in passenger traffic during the summer months of 2012, which is still currently on the rise as the New Year begins.

In total, KEF saw a 9 percent increase in passenger traffic during its busiest months in 2012 than those of 2011. This trend continued to increase in September, and we predict a 12.4 percent increase in passenger traffic by the end of 2012 – with a total of 2.4 million passengers predicted during the whole of 2012.

With this in mind, Isavia (the company operating Keflavík International Airport) has complemented this passenger increase by upgrading the Leifur Eiríksson Air Terminal. Amongst the upgrades include its terminal waiting areas and access, and its automatic check-in service. Isavia continues to maximise efficiency of its facilities with new pre-boarding lounges and relocating various support functions.

In addition to this, Guðný Jóhannsdóttir, on behalf of Isavia, took part in the 18^th World Route Development Forum in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, between 30th September and 2nd October; one of the most important industry events for aviation, tourism, and the route development community.

Isavia is looking to expand the airport’s network with new routes and customers who contribute to passenger growth. In order to achieve this, the company offers customers incentives including discounts on landing and passenger charges for new routes.

An airline that initiates a new route, which is not presently connected by regular flights from Keflavík International Airport, will benefit from discounts on the Landing Charge and Passenger Charge. The proposed route is one that will increase the network coverage and passenger traffic volumes and is one that has a commercial benefit to KEF.

Isavia offers a passenger increase bonus to reward airlines contributing to passenger growth for KEF. The bonus is 800 ISK per departing international passenger during IATA Summer Season (excluding June, July, August) and 1600 ISK during the IATA Winter Season, based on the number of passengers for which passenger charge is payable. The company being invoiced passenger charges for the flight (aircraft owner, subsidiary aircraft operator) is the beneficiary for receiving the bonus.

Furthermore, Keflavík International Airport was voted as the best small airport in Europe for the 2011 season by the Airports Council International; the airport was awarded for the category of best airport for 2 million passengers or less, however, KEF actually came out on top in terms of service, but since it was placed in the smaller airports category, was not able to come out on top overall.

As part of the survey, participants answered a number of questions about the quality of more than 36 service factors, such as its helpfulness and courtesy of staff, ease of flight connections, cleanliness, check-in times, and for the overall customer satisfaction.

For more information regarding Keflavík International Airport, and its business incentives, visit http://b2b.kefairport.is/english/.

To view KEF’s latest B2B magazine Airmail, visit http://www.kefairport.is/airmail/2012-4/.