Finnish charterer Jetflite started JAR OPS-1 commercial operations with a Citation Excel recently from its Helsinki base. The aircraft’s owner is one of the company’s former charter customers who decided to buy his own aircraft.

The Excel joins a Challenger 604, three Falcon 20F-5s and one Beech King Air 200 already managed and chartered by Jetflite. “I don’t know what is behind the decision,” said Juhani Missonen of Jetflite, “but I think the Citation Excel is actually a very good aeroplane. It is suitable for [the owner’s] purposes; he owns his own company and does a lot of business travelling.

“One remarkable aspect of the Citation Excel is that the luggage space is so big. A lot of clients are travelling on hunting trips or golfing trips so there is a lot of baggage. The interior is very nice looking and the owner doesn’t want to use it for anything other than passenger missions. It has a club seat interior with a two seat sofa.”

Although Jetflite had no hand in the aircraft purchase, either as a broker or advisor, Missonen believes that buying a brand new aircraft was a sound move for the owner: “If you have the money in your pocket, and you buy a new aircraft, and a good one, it is safe money,” he said.

The Excel arrived at Helsinki at the beginning of July. Jetflite made the arrangements to get it onto its JAR OPS, and the aeroplane started flying in October. “We don’t yet have much experience of the aircraft, we have flown 75 hours, mostly with the owner, so I don’t have any opinion about the [charter] client’s view of the aircraft. The aeroplane has been flying to different locations in central Europe, which is where the owner’s business is. From our point of view it is very nice aeroplane, very suitable for our needs because we didn’t have any entry-level aircraft until now.

“We were operating three Falcons and the Challenger, and for the sort of customers who want an entry level jet, these were too expensive. The Excel is more cost effective, the operating cost is lower.”

According to Missonen, who is the sales and marketing director at Jetflite, a large proportion of the company’s customers are Russians:

“We have one remarkable advantage compared to other European operators,” he said, “because we are very close to Moscow and St Petersburg. [Our Russian clients] are good customers, they very much appreciate good service, and [the standard of] the aeroplane. They mostly use the Challenger; and they mostly go to European business metropolises like London.”

Business aviation is still uncommon in Russia, reports Missonen. “There are a small group of people with a lot of money who can use that type of service. Of course we have heavy competition from local operators, but I think that the reason for our success is that we are so close to Moscow. We have Russian clients who call and say, ‘I need an aircraft within three or four hours’.

“There is one business operator in Moscow using western aircraft – two Hawker 700s and one Falcon 20C; and then we have some private corporate jets, but mostly operated and managed by western operators;

and of course there are some local operators with Yak 40s or Tupolev 134s.

“The level of service of business aviation [in Russia] is very poor,” claimed Missonen. “And they have a lot of difficulties with their Tupolevs and Yaks flying to European destinations, because of commercial regulations. It is not so easy for a Russian company to get permission from western European CAAs because of noise regulations and economic restrictions: They have to make some advance payments for landing fees or fuelling. That’s a problem for them, it’s not so easy for Russian companies.

“I don’t know how to say it, but the difference between Russian and western aircraft is like the difference between day and night,” he said. “But it is the Russian culture, those who have never been in western business aircraft would never know about service and which type of aircraft you would use. Aviation itself in Russia has a long history. They work in a different way.”

From Jetflite’s point of view, the first nine months of 2001 have seen a slight drop in overall demand for business travel over 2000. The Russian market, however, has been steadily building.

Jetflite has been in business since 1980 and now employs 34 staff, including 16 full time mechanics and pilots. As well as aircraft management and charter, the company flies air ambulance as Euro-Flight, specialising in medevac missions in the former USSR.