Monarch Airlines Summer 2012 Flight Programme for Birmingham and East Midlands Airports

LONDON, May 23, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --

• Expanded services from Birmingham Airport, including new scheduled flights to Nice and Barcelona
• First programme of scheduled flights from new UK base, East Midlands Airport

Monarch, the leading scheduled leisure airline, has today expanded its flight programme for Summer 2012, introducing two new scheduled flights to Barcelona and Nice from Birmingham Airport. The airline also today launched its first programme of flights from its new UK base, East Midlands Airport, operating to key leisure destinations across the Mediterranean.

Flights for Summer 2012 from East Midlands Airport will start from 31^st August 2012 and will include daily services to Malaga, Alicante, Faro (Portugal) and Palma (Majorca) all available to book via http://www.monarch.co.uk.

New and additional flights from Birmingham Airport will start from 20^th July 2012 and include the following services:

• Nice* - Daily flights
• Malaga - 4 additional weekly flights (Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays)
• Barcelona* - 4 weekly flights (Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays)
• Majorca - 3 additional weekly flights (Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays)
• Alicante - 3 additional weekly flights (Mondays, Tuesdays and Sundays)
• Faro - 2 additional weekly flights (Thursdays and Saturdays)
• Rome - 2 additional weekly flights (Mondays and Wednesdays)
• Dalaman - 1 additional weekly flight (Fridays)
• Ibiza - 1 additional weekly flight (Wednesdays)
• Tenerife - 1 additional weekly flight (Saturdays)

 Commenting on the additional flights for Summer 2012 flights and the new routes, Managing Director of Monarch Airlines, Kevin George said, "“We are delighted to be expanding our Summer 2012 flights programme from Birmingham Airport and launching our first programme of flights from East Midlands Airport; providing greater choice to our customers in the Midlands.

"The launch of operations from East Midlands accelerates the strategy we announced last year to focus on the development of our scheduled operations into key leisure destinations across the Mediterranean, the Canaries and North Africa.

"The addition of new daily services from Birmingham Airport to Nice, a new scheduled destination for the airline and the new services to Barcelona supports our determination to deliver an all-encompassing proposition; offering choice, value and superior customer service from all of the major gateways in the UK."

Notes to Editors:

*New scheduled routes

Monarch, the leading scheduled leisure airline, has to date operated flights to Croatia, Cyprus, Egypt, Gibraltar, Greece, Italy, Portugal Spain and Turkey from Birmingham, London Gatwick, London Luton and Manchester airports. In addition to year-round low fares, Monarch also offers a bespoke "build your own class of travel" range of products and services both on the ground and inflight.  Monarch has always aimed at offering high quality service - all customers are allocated a seat at check-in, but for those wishing to select where in the cabin they sit to ensure that families and groups are seated together, seats can be pre-booked from £5.99 per one-way flight.  For customers looking for added comfort, extra legroom seats are also available offering up to six inches of extra space from only £9.99.

Monarch recently launched 'Air Packs' enabling customers to build their own flights through transparent and pre-packaged optional extras, starting from just £20 per person per flight. The two new Air Packs are offered alongside the airline's traditional "build your own class" product and are designed to give customers full visibility on price from the beginning of the booking process. Customers are able to choose between two Monarch Air Packs: an Essentials Pack and a Premium Pack, combining extras such as allocated seating, hold baggage and access to online check-in.

Customers can also take advantage of MFlex, which provides improved flexibility for customers when booking flights on Monarch's scheduled network of flights.  Charged at only £2.50 per person, per flight, the new MFlex product must be added at the time of booking.  Once added, the customer is free to make one change to their booking up to 15 days prior to departure, which includes a date change or a route change, without incurring an administration fee*.  What's more, if a customer selects MFlex when booking, but makes no subsequent changes to their booking, Monarch will refund them the value of MFlex in the form of a credit voucher, which can be used as part payment towards a future scheduled flight with Monarch.

For further information or to book Monarch flights please visit http://www.monarch.co.uk

For further media information contact
Jo Leigh in the press office
Tel: +44(0)1582-398-287
Email: [email protected]

SOURCE Monarch Airlines