LONDON, England (Reuters) --British Airways Plc, Europe's biggest airline, said it carried more passengers and filled more seats in November than at the same time a year ago thanks to fare promotions that lured customers onto its flights.
BA, which has been slashing costs more aggressively than its European rivals to cope with an industry downturn, said on Wednesday traffic in November rose by 7.4 percent from last year. It added that its revenue outlook continued to look more stable.
November's passenger load factor -- the percentage of filled seats - rose by 3.4 points to 71.8 percent.
"This month we have seen (volumes) go up a bit and frankly the reason for that was quite significant promotional activity that we put into the market," BA's head of investor relations George Stinnes told reporters.
He acknowledged that the promotions, such as one to commemorate 100 years of flight and another for the Rugby World Cup in Australia, had put more people on its planes but also squeezed yields.
"The fares that we promoted were also quite aggressive," he said.
BA said there were signs that the lucrative but hard-hit premium market -- first and business class -- was holding up, although short-haul premium flights were still suffering. Companies intent on cutting costs have slashed corporate travel budgets, and no-frills carriers have taken part of that business away from full service airlines like BA.
The increase in traffic consisted of a 2.5 percent rise in premium traffic and an 8.4 percent increase in non-premium traffic. The promotions benefited non-premium traffic, Stinnes said.
Other carriers are also showing signs of recovery. Dutch airline KLM -- which will merge with Air France next year -- said earlier it had also improved its passenger load factor in November but unlike BA failed to raise traffic volume.
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