Corporate Responsibility

This Corporate Responsibility Report reflects the importance the Group places on developing long-lasting relationships with its customers, and enduring, effective partnerships with its suppliers, whilst acknowledging and acting upon its responsibility to the communities within which it operates and to the wider environment. The way in which the group pursues its objective of being a good employer is set out in the section entitled “Our People” in the Annual Report.

Relationship With Customers

We take people on holiday! Our UK Leisure Travel business specialises in the provision of scheduled holiday flights by our award-winning leisure airline, Jet2.com, and ATOL licensed package holidays by our acclaimed tour operator, Jet2holidays, to destinations in the Mediterranean, the Canary Islands and to European Leisure Cities.

We know that taking a holiday is one of the most important family experiences of the year and we relish the trust our customers place in us to give them a fantastic holiday experience. Despite the current challenges of Covid-19, going forward we remain committed to doing our very best to ensure that each of our customers “has a lovely holiday” that can be both eagerly anticipated and fondly remembered, supported by our core principles of being family friendly, offering value for money and giving a truly VIP customer service. 

In the early stages of the Covid-19 crisis, for those customers who were on holiday when travel restrictions came into force, our team of Customer Helpers assisted in every way they could, leading to positive feedback from satisfied customers who felt they were well-looked after and well-informed throughout. In addition, and despite the severe disruption and travel restrictions, we operated more than 60 repatriation flights to bring our many thousands of customers safely home.

During the 3 months since the Covid-19 lockdown came into force, we have operated a fully functioning customer contact centre of over 600 remote workers to ensure our valued customers receive assistance in either rebooking a future holiday or obtaining a refund. As a result, Jet2.com and Jet2holidays were ranked as the best travel firms for providing refunds on the back of the pandemic, according to a travel refund cancellation survey of more than 77,000 people by MoneySavingExpert.com (MSE).

Relationship With Suppliers

Our Leisure Travel business is supported by more than 3,800 non-hotel suppliers who work with us and we seek open, constructive and effective relationships with them to help sustain the successful delivery of the Group’s Leisure Travel services. In December 2019, our annual supplier conference was held at which the Chief Executive Officer, the Group Chief Financial Officer and a number of Jet2.com directors set out their vision for the future and described how building partnerships with suppliers is key to achieving mutual objectives and ultimately delighting our customers.  This full day conference provided an opportunity for suppliers to ask questions directly to the directors, and for the Group to learn more about what our suppliers require to build a successful partnership.

The Group has continued to invest in carefully developed relationships with over 4,000 Jet2holidays’ hotel partners, often placing substantial deposits to secure a dependable and competitive room offering in the most attractive hotels. Our Chief Executive Officer spends significant time overseas developing these relationships, hearing first-hand from key partners about their expectations and how the customer experience may be improved through the development of their hotels.  It is also an opportunity to reiterate the importance of effective risk management by the hoteliers, maintaining the highest standards of safety and hygiene at all times so that Jet2holidays can continue to offer “package holidays you can trust”.

We also recognise that paying both our hotel partners and non-hotel suppliers on time and in full is vital for their financial well-being. Under the ’Duty to report on payment practices and performance’ legislation, the Group has uploaded the relevant supplier key performance indicators onto the HMRC government portal with the average time taken to pay supplier invoices during the year being 25.3 days (2019: 27.1 days).

Modern Slavery Act

The Modern Slavery Act requires the Company to publish an annual slavery and human trafficking statement. The latest statement can be found on the Jet2 plc website here. Neither the Company nor any of its subsidiaries permit, condone or otherwise accept any form of human trafficking or slavery in its business or supply chains.

The Environment

The Group is keen to align its business strategy with broader sustainability issues. This means that we not only work within the business, but also take responsibility to effectively engage with our partners, associations, supply chains and customers to achieve tangible and long-lasting benefits to the environment and communities within which we operate.

The Group takes its environmental obligations seriously, with CO₂ emissions from fuel having the biggest impact. Although both travel and tourism contribute to climate change, they are and will increasingly be, adversely impacted by it. Extreme weather events, such as the recent sandstorms in the Canary Islands, can result in delays, disruption and diversions to our flights, whilst the increased risk of extreme weather events such as storms, floods and wildfires resulting from climate change, can have a significant impact on coastal tourism. 

Tackling climate change is therefore a priority for the business. We endeavour to operate in the most efficient and environmentally friendly way possible, minimising emissions and the carbon impact per unit of product delivered (intensity). In addition, efficient operation also helps to minimise our impact on noise and air quality.

The Group monitors its greenhouse gas emissions and uses CO₂ emissions per £ million of turnover as a measure of its environmental intensity. In the year ended 31 March 2020, total energy use from electricity, gas and fuel was 9.42 TWh ⁽¹⁾, equating to 2.5 kWh per £ turnover. The associated carbon emissions from this energy use were 2.3 million tonnes ⁽¹⁾, equating to 622 tonnes per £ million turnover.

Energy consumption and emissions primarily arose from our aircraft operations and ground handling activities, along with our Distribution & Logistics business, business travel, offices, hangars and engineering facilities.

In the most recently published Atmosfair index, Jet2.com was included in the top 15 of the world’s most fuel-efficient airlines. Additionally, Jet2.com’s CO₂ emissions per passenger kilometre of 67g puts it amongst the most efficient airlines in Europe.

Jet2.com supports the introduction of the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) and its goal of zero CO₂ emission growth from international aviation beyond 2020. We are developing a compliance strategy for CORSIA which ensures we purchase carbon offsets which have additional benefits beyond avoiding carbon emissions, such as increasing biodiversity, reducing inequality and improving health & wellbeing.

Jet2.com also has a continuous drive to operate more efficiently, through its “efficient flying” programme. The impact of this programme in the year resulted in a marginal increase in efficiency as CO₂ emissions per passenger kilometre reduced from 67.03g to 66.95g, this despite considerable disruption to the flying programme towards the end of the financial year. The programme focuses on all aspects of the airline’s operation which can influence or directly impact the efficiency of its flying activities including: single engine taxi operations; careful fuel requirement planning; performance-based navigation approaches; reduced contingency fuel; reduced thrust take offs and continuous descents; and using electric ramp vehicles and fixed electrical ground power and pre-conditioned air where available. These actions, combined with ongoing weight saving initiatives from lightweight seats, lighter catering carts, the removal of paper manuals and the introduction of carbon brakes have saved over 30,000t CO₂ this year. In addition, the Group’s previous investment in 34 Boeing 737-800NG aircraft saved over 91,000t CO₂ this year in a like-for-like comparison against our existing fleet, and 93% of the total fleet is fitted with fuel saving winglets which also saved an additional 90,000t CO₂. Combined, these measures have saved over 211,000t CO₂ this year, equivalent to taking 116,000 cars off the road.

It is not only the environmental impact of our aircraft fleet that we look to reduce. Our ground handling operations, which deliver services to nearly 50% of our flights, have had material investment in new equipment with 42% of our entire ground service equipment now electric. With over 70% of our aircraft tractors meeting the Euro 5 / 6 standard, all ramp cars and minibuses meeting the Euro 6 standard, and telemetry being installed on board our ground service equipment to monitor fuel use, our equipment is highly efficient and minimises not only CO₂ emissions, but also noise and pollutants that give rise to air quality issues, thereby minimising the environmental impact on our local communities.

In addition to carbon emissions, we have also focused on other environmental impacts within our operations. Our Inflight Retail team have made good progress in reducing single use plastics, replacing products with more sustainable alternatives such as wooden cutlery and cardboard meal boxes. Where non-plastic alternatives are unavailable at present, we are turning to products made from a higher proportion of recycled plastics such as rPET water bottles. As part of our commitment to the circular economy, we began our in-flight recycling programme in November 2019. We estimate this programme will help us to recycle up to 50% of waste on-board as well as enabling us to recycle material which previously would have gone to landfill, such as rPET plastic products, closing the loop by ensuring these materials are able to be used again.

Health, Safety and Security

The responsibility for the health and safety of all colleagues and customers, whilst in our care, is a key priority for the Group and is described in more detail on pages 25 and 26 of the Jet2 plc Annual Report & Accounts 2020.

Our Communities

Across the Group, we endeavour to support our local communities in a variety of ways, including the provision of prizes for local fundraising activities. The Group also continues to support its chosen charity, Hope for Children www.hope-for-children.org.

Our colleagues regularly visit schools and colleges across the country, and through these visits we hope to attract and develop young talent, while raising awareness of the broad array of career opportunities available at Jet2.com and Jet2holidays.

In addition, the Group has also launched the Jet2Suite in partnership with Leeds Beckett University, which will see students who are studying degrees in International Tourism Management and Hospitality Business Management receive interactive training and seminars in the classrooms.

We select, train, develop and promote our employees based on their ability and aptitude. The Group has a policy of treating job applicants and employees in the same way, regardless of their gender, race, ethnic origin or disability. We retain employees who become disabled during their employment whenever possible.

Jet2.com & Jet2holidays Gender Pay Gap Report 2018

Jet2.com & Jet2holidays Gender Pay Gap Report 2017