Etihad Airways has partnered with Philippine Airlines (PAL), Austria Airlines (OS) and Airlink South Africa (4Z), and relaunched interline links with Biman Bangladesh and codeshares with Air Seychelles (HM) and ITA Airways (AZ).
This means consumers of all these airlines can take advantage of enhanced connectivity to destinations across each other’s networks. They can book on a single ticket and only have to check in once at the start of their flight, with their baggage checked through to their end destination.
Arik De, Etihad’s Chief Revenue Officer, said the airline is broadening its network reach to allow more guests to visit Abu Dhabi. The six interline/code agreements makes life easier for consumers of the airlines involved. “With Austrian Airlines, this tie-in gives our guests access up to 58 European destinations via Vienna, operated by Etihad daily during the summer, and joins the other four members of the Lufthansa Group with whom we already have interline or codeshare agreements,” the executive explained. “Our deal with Airlink South Africa gives connecting guests via our Johannesburg flight seamless access to 16 domestic destinations in South Africa, and 25 regional African destinations, and it complements our existing options with South African Airways.”
The deal with Airlink South Africa gives connecting guest via Etihad’s Johannesburg flight seamless access to 16 domestic destinations in South Africa, and 25 regional African destinations. Teaming up with Philippine Airlines provides easy access to 19 domestic Filipino destinations, including Cebu, Cagayan de Oro, Davao and Kalobo, to and from Etihad’s double daily Manila service, for the large Filipino diaspora living in the UAE.
Arik De said Etihad’s links with Biman and Air Seychelles were affected by those airlines’ own system migrations over the last 12 months. “We are pleased to reconnect with them to complement our own Dhaka and Mahe services, and offer further destinations, such as Chittagong and Praslin. Etihad’s successful partnership with ITA Airways over Rome Fiumicino to Italy, Europe and beyond have also been restored following ITA’s own Amadeus Altea migration in February.”
The airline will progressively rollout the codeshare offerings across Etihad’s sales channels over the coming weeks.
