Athens Named European Airport 2011
In the highly challenging environment of the air-transport sector, it is all the more important that airports continually monitor their performances and adapt accordingly. To truly achieve excellence, the ideal airport must offer a wide range of destinations, high quality customer service, superior design, and fast baggage processing and passenger throughput. It is because of this that the Institute of Transport Management has named Athens International Airport the title of “European Airport of the Year 2011”.
Since Athens International Airport (AIA) opened its doors on March 28th 2001, it has received a range of awards for excellence. In the last six years, for example, AIA has been honoured with eight ROUTES airport marketing distinctions, the only airport in the world with such a record.
It serves thousands of passengers daily and handles vast amounts of merchandise and luggage, while it accommodates over 70 airlines that provide secure links to a myriad of destinations in all continents. With an initial €2.2 billion investment, the new airport was built in a record time of fifty-one months, replacing its predecessor and offering a modern, spacious and state-of-the-art environment.
The level of customer service the airport provides to all of its customers – from passengers to airlines – is of great importance to AIA. It has developed an extensive service quality monitoring system, using a set of highly sophisticated business intelligence tools comprising AIA’s Passenger Survey (Corporate KPI), the Quality Monitor Survey, the ACI/ASQ Benchmarking, and AIA’s qualitative monitoring via Mystery Shopping. For passengers, it offers the latest in technological innovations, in order to improve the airport experience to airport users. It is working – a 2010 study revealed that the general public consistently evaluate AIA “very favourably”.
One of AIA’s most recent initiatives is the “Customer Centric Culture” project, which is aimed at its airline customers. It offers incentive schemes aiming at encouraging and supporting their developmental plans for Athens, by relieving at the same time a significant part of their operational costs during the first years of their operations at the airport. Three recent incentives of the project have proven particularly popular.
The “5th Freedom Traffic Rights Incentive” aims to enhance the attractiveness of Athens as an intermediate point and encourage long haul services, while the “Growth Incentive” is aimed at incentivising growth, by providing a 100 percent annual discount on landing and parking charges for airlines planning bulk international developments out of Athens; the third incentive acknowledges the difficult situation of the Greek Aviation market. The “Passenger Seasonal Incentive” is fixed discount amount for each additional passenger carried by the airlines between a certain period.
As well as this in 2011, for a third consecutive year, the decision was taken to maintain all airport charges unchanged without any inflationary adjustments. AIA truly is an airport that knows that it must take care of its primary customers, the airlines, in order to flourish!
Corporate social responsibility is important to Athens and it goes beyond simple compliance with guidelines with its strategies. It is also locally responsible. The airport is the most important business entity of the local Mesogheia area, representing 47% of the area’s GDP and -through the airport community - 22% of the total number of jobs in the area. At the same time the airport has boosted local employment by creating 8,000 jobs for local residents (direct or indirect) and contributing annual value to the area of €693 million. Finally, in relation to relevant studies for other major European airports, the performance of Athens International Airport is in the upper range of the relevant benchmark. Conclusively, this study is a very valuable tool, demonstrating the importance of the airport for the country’s economy and society.
Commenting on the Award to Athens, Patrick Sheedy, Media & PR Director for the Institute said:
“AIA truly is a full service airport that goes above and beyond the call of duty for all of its customers and stakeholders. It is also highly successful at what it does. Despite the unfavourable macroeconomic situation in Greece and abroad, it recorded high profits in 2009 and expects to do so again for 2010. Its innovative marketing strategies and commitment to continual innovation makes it an airport with an eye on the future. Congratulations to the entire AIA team. The award of ‘European Airport of the Year 2011’ is richly deserved.”