German airline Lufthansa will offer passengers a “return-flight guarantee” during the coronavirus pandemic, CEO Carsten Spohr told German media.
“Anyone who wants to go back to Germany, we’ll bring them back,” Spohr told the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper’s Sunday edition.
“Be it because they are not allowed to enter the destination country due to recording a high temperature, they have to be quarantined there or because the virus has broken out.
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“In all these cases there will be a guaranteed return flight,” Spohr said.
He did not go into details, but additionally expressed confidence that demand for private travel would return very quickly.
Lufthansa had come under severe pressure during the coronavirus pandemic, as nearly all flights were grounded for months.
Now that some countries are lifting travel bans, Lufthansa wants to entice passengers back on board.
Thousands of jobs are now at stake in the group, which employs about 138,000 people.
The company is in the later stages of agreement with the German government over a bail-out agreement worth around 9 billion euros (10.1 billion dollars).
Spohr also called for consideration of “government incentives for new aircraft” and also spoke of an “innovation premium”.
“A new aircraft needs up to 25 per cent less fuel and to generate 50 per cent less noise than its predecessor. The jump is enormous.”
If more new aircraft were purchased, it would help “the environment, the aircraft manufacturers and the airlines,” Spohr said.
Lufthansa is negotiating with Boeing and Airbus on taking delivery of planes later than agreed.