Archive for the 'MAXjet' Category
December 24 2007
MAXjet announced it is filing for bankruptcy and ceasing all flights today. If you are in the middle of travel on MAXjet, you will be reaccomodated on Eos if you are flying to New York (a good thing, trust me), or on another airline if you are flying to LA or Vegas. If you have a MAXjet ticket, you should ask your credit card company or travel agent for a refund.
This is a perfect example of just how difficult it is to succeed as an airline. MAXjet was offering a product that was perhaps half-a-step lower in quality than its US-based competitors, but charging about 80% less. And they still couldn’t make it work (it didn’t help that for the first year and change of their operations their planes were far less-than-reliable. Nobody tried to match MAXjet on fares, but I wouldn’t be surprised if SilverJet, which was positioned between MAXjet and Eos, tried to bring their prices up a bit (they’re struggling as well).
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December 07 2007
Alas poor MAXjet, we hardly knew ye:
The lowfare business class airline has asked that trading in its shares be suspended until it clarifies its financial position. They are not doing this because their financial position is even better than everyone thought. When Eos and MAXjet were the only two small carriers flying New York to Stansted, they had a chance because they were so differentiated. Once Silverjet (slightly more expensive, much better product though they fly to Luton), and American (worse product, but frequent flyer program) entered, and fuel prices roughly doubled from they launched, it was pretty much over by then. Sure, they’ll still be around for a bit, but this is a terrible sign. Shame - you could get a pretty nice seat over to London for $1200 round trip. I’d expect Silverjet to up their fares a bit closer to Eos once MAXjet is gone.
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September 24 2007
In case you were wondering how MAXjet was doing, you can see here that they posted a $31 million loss on $27 million in revenue for the first half of 2007. Yes, it’s difficult to run an airline profitably.
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July 18 2007
It will never happen, but MAXjet has applied to launch Seattle to Shanghai service in 2009. It would be the only all-business-class airline serving Asia. No chance they get the nod, but it suggests that MAXjet is looking beyond its London routes if it ever hopes to make a profit.
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May 03 2007
MAXjet announced that it will begin 4-times-weekly flights from Los Angeles to London with fares that start at $699 each way. That is stupid cheap for the business class service. They’re also upping frequencies to Vegas and Washington, DC. The airline has made a huge improvement in its operations over the past 3 months, so, for the sake of all of us cheapskates out there, that they’re able to handle this service increase gracefully.
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April 10 2007
I’ll give credit where it’s due: After bagging a bit on MAXjet for their miserable reliability, they’ve turned things around a bit. The Cranky Flier has a good (email) interview with a MAXjet exec where we learn that, indeed, they HAVE filed their financial data that I’ve complained they haven’t filed (they don’t know why it’s not showing up on the DOT website), and that after a miserable reliability record last year, they’ve only canceled 1 flight in the past 2 months, and they’ve amassed a 90% ontime record during the same period.
I will give them a ton of credit for pulling the Washington, DC, filghts which allowed them to free up aircraft to provide better service. Well done.
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February 02 2007
I’ve finished up my project at Eos, so I feel a bit more comfortable talking about MAXjet now.
A couple of suspicious things have happened over in MAXjetville…
– The MAXjet forum over at airlinequality.com is well worth a read. It would appear (unless ALL of those people are lying. And they’re not.) that they constantly cancel or delay flights for mechanical reasons. You can also do your own research at flightaware.com to see how often their flights actually depart on time or at all. It’s not pretty.
– As I didn’t mention when it was announced, MAXjet cancelled its 4 weekly flights from Washington to London to add 1 additional flight from Las Vegas to London. What happened to the plane that was flying the additional frequencies to London? Is it even in service anymore?
– Airlines –both public and private–need to report financial data to the government, which is then published in a consumer unfriendly format here. If you care, you can find Eos’ financials in there. But more importantly, you will not find MAXjet’s financials in there. Why? I have no idea. Though it would be interesting for someone who is a reporter (ie, not me) to do a little digging and find out why they are allowed to not disclose financial data, but every other airline must. Hm.
So, not to speculate (oh wait, yes I am speculating), when you add up frequently cancelled flights + inability to serve 3 cities + CEO departing + financials not disclosed, this would suggest a bit of a mess. There’s a story here..
I’m certainly interested in hearing any MAXjet passenger tales if you have them…
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October 09 2006
MAXjet has had a series of really cheap promotions going on lately, and here’s another:
Book by October 23rd and fly between November 15 and March 15, and you can get a roundtrip ticket from either Las Vegas or Washington to London for just $999. That’s in business class. The Vegas fare is just insane. Seriously. Insane.
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September 19 2006
Since Delta’s $999 round trip business class fare from New York to London expired last week, it’s time for another airline to come in and fill the void: MAXjet is now offering the same fare from both New York and Washington to London on its all-business-class 767s. Its seats are like a comfortable domestic business class, not the lie-flat-and-cashmere-blanket business class, but for $999, it’s a great deal. Book by October 1 and fly between November 1 and February 28.
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July 26 2006
The Times of India is reporting that India’s Kingfisher Airlines (named after a beer, mind you) is in talks to purchase MAXjet. Kingfisher’s owner has made it clear that he would like to own an airline in the US, which he can’t do since he’s not a citizen. But his kids are, so he’s hoping they can buy it. In any case, he wants a foothold in the US to give him rights to fly to India. MAXjet is vehemently denying a sale. I’m shocked — shocked! — you can’t always believe what you read in the newspaper.
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Bye Bye, MAXjet