The UK JetCard team has sold more than £5m of cards in the first six months of the year as Britain’s jet set take to the skies again. JetCards, like Oyster cards, hold prepaid travel credits but for use on private jets. The highest value JetCard sold in the period had £1m of prepaid flying hours registered on it, and the average value was £200k.

Commenting on UK JetCard sales, Paul Richardson, Air Partner’s Director for Private Jets said, “This is over double the amount we sold for the entire year last year - twice the amount in half the time. We’ve invested a lot in getting our product right and it’s great to see such a positive response from clients.”

In addition to improved sales, Air Partner’s JetCard renewals have also performed well with 53 UK JetCard renewals in the first 6 months of the financial year, compared with 61 renewals for the whole of the prior 12 month period. Richardson commented, “In just six months we are only eight JetCard renewals short of the total we achieved in the whole of the last 12 months. There is a tremendous team effort being put in from the UK Sales and UK JetCard teams, which is leading to some very impressive results.”

Air Partner, which flies for six of the G8 group of governments and various Heads of State and Royal families, believes that recent success in UK JetCard sales is driven by a better understanding of who its clients are and what services they require. This has enabled the company to develop a private jet product that allows its users greater flexibility. Below are some interesting observations around the make-up of Air Partner’s JetCard users:

• In the six month period, the biggest buyers of Air Partner’s JetCard were Britons with international property and business interests within six hours of London.

• 60% of UK JetCard customers are self-employed or owner managers and use their JetCard for both business and leisure.

• The next largest segment of users is corporates using a JetCard for business travel purposes.

• By segmentation, the top four sectors using JetCards are (1) Investment management (2) Property (3) Retail and (4) Inherited wealth.

• The majority of UK JetCard sales in the period were to British residents. However, the company is seeing a growing number of sales to international high net worth individuals, reflecting London’s status as a leading international hub and the capital’s high end property boom.

Paul Richardson commented, “What was once a market with just one or two players has expanded to meet a growing demand for private aviation – albeit off a low base. This growth is leading to a number of changes in the market place and customers need to ensure they have partnered with high quality, established providers of private aviation solutions, and not Mom and Pop brokers offering a deal to get started. Reputable providers will be able to easily establish their credentials if asked, for example insurance and guarantees for all their charters, flexibility, aircraft choice and not just acting as the person in the middle.”

Independent aviation consultants Conklin & de Decker assessed the jet card programmes offered by two of Europe’s most established providers of private jet card programmes - NetJets Europe and Air Partner. The card products were assessed across six key criteria and the independent research give 51 year old Air Partner the ‘advantage’ over NetJets Europe in four out of six criteria, and ranked Air Partner and NetJets Europe’s products as ‘comparable’ in the remaining two areas. The six areas that Conklin and de Decker based its ‘key findings’ on were (i) Accessible Service Areas (ii) Notice Period (iii) Aircraft Choice (iv) Pricing (v) Flexibility, and (vi) Quality Assurance, Service and Safety. Air Partner, which is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is the largest listed air charter broker, does not recognise any of the revenue from JetCard sales as profit until the client has used the hours.