KLM Cityhopper has announced its decision to close the last 3x remaining crew bases in the UK.
These crew bases employ 47 British pilots and cabin crew and are leftover from the former Air UK days.

KLM purchased Air UK in 1997 and initially created the KLM uk brand.
The KLM uk brand was absorbed in KLM Cityhopper in 2002.
The former Air UK crews have been operating for KLM Cityhopper for the last 21 years, though many will be newly recruited.

The closing of the Air UK crew bases will mean that all UK based crews dead-head to AMS to commence flight operations.
No jobs are lost, all crew will remain in KLM Cityhopper employment, though they will be free to change employer if they so desire.

Air UK Engineering still remains active in Norwich under the name KLM uk Engineering and maintains most of KLM's short haul fleet. https://www.klmukengineering.com/
No change is foreseen in this relationship.

Which bases are the remaining ones to be closed? I used Air UK and KLMuk a lot back in the day on the 146 and F100 and the crew were always excellent. A great addition to KLM Cityhopper (where I have also never encountered an "off" crew...).

I knew Cityhopper were employing some UK staff but wasn’t aware it still had UK crew bases.

Didn’t know they still had bases . Thought KLM uk became buzz and sold to Ryanair

[*]

f4f3a wrote:

Didn’t know they still had bases . Thought KLM uk became buzz and sold to Ryanair

I honestly thought the same. I was under the impression that all Air UK crew were transitioned to Buzz (and then jettisoned). I didn’t realise there were bases still flying for KL.

I second the question of where these three bases were?

If crew are required to deadhead to AMS is that paid for by the company or are they required to commute at their own expense? Certainly a fascinating topic!

Hello, I worked for Air UK (then KLM uk) in EDI from 1998-2001. There were a number of cabin bases across UK including GLA, EDI, ABZ, STN, NWI...and am sure there were others too. When KLM uk created buzz, all flights to AMS were kept as KLM uk and the STN ops (apart from STN-AMS) became buzz. This resulted in a number of redundancies at regional bases but all were kept open for flights to and from AMS. At this time regional UK based crew were also encouraged to relocate to AMS. The Fokkers kept operating from the regions to and from AMS and the 146s all headed to STN for buzz ops.

In terms of crew commuting to and from AMS, they paid the standby fare themselves. Any deadhead flights were obviously covered by the company!

Happy to answer anymore questions on this!

Buzz was created as a separate division of KLM UK , maintaining 2 separate brands of KLM UK and Buzz . Ryanair only acquired the Buzz division from KLM leaving the much reduced KLM UK still operating before it was absorbed into KLM Cityhopper

Also remember that KLM over night aircraft at HUY , NWI and MME where the UK crews are based

I also recall that STN-based crew had two uniforms - one for each brand!

Still no answer to the question, where does KL still have those 3 crew bases?

TOGA10 wrote:

Still no answer to the question, where does KL still have those 3 crew bases?

LBA (Leeds/Bradford)
HUY (Humberside)
NWI (Norwich)

777klm wrote:

TOGA10 wrote:

Still no answer to the question, where does KL still have those 3 crew bases?

LBA (Leeds/Bradford)
HUY (Humberside)
NWI (Norwich)

Thanks!

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

Obviously I can’t speak for all passengers, but you are on a flight to the UK. After the plane’s doors open nobody will speak Dutch anymore. So if you get an extra 40 minutes of that it should not be ground for a lot of anxiety me thinks.

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

I've been on the odd KLM, GLA to AMS flight where the cabin crew were all English, I presumed them to be KLM-UK staff. Whether or not they spoke Dutch I've no idea ?

Most Dutch people speak better English than many in the UK.

I remember that one of by lecturers at Uni was Dutch. Apart from some 'flatness' you would not have known.

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

Amsterdam cab drivers, hotel receptionists and McDonalds staff often don't speak Dutch either so I guess it wouldn't be an issue.

Jetty wrote:

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

Amsterdam cab drivers, hotel receptionists and McDonalds staff often don't speak Dutch either so I guess it wouldn't be an issue.

Forgive me, I didn’t think it would be an issue as pointed above a lot of Dutch people speak far more technically correct Dutch than native English speakers. Was more curious around perceptions, which don’t seem to be an issue.

I only ask as I’ve always found it odd when language speakers don’t speak the native language of their home port. Eg CZ has based in AMS,CDG and SYD, but mandarin isn’t a prerequisite of employment which I always found unusual.

I was on a KLC Embraer flight last year within Europe into AMS which was operated by a Humberside-based crew. Absolutely fine - no-one seemed to notice or care that the crew didn't speak Dutch.

Jetty wrote:

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

Amsterdam cab drivers, hotel receptionists and McDonalds staff often don't speak Dutch either so I guess it wouldn't be an issue.

What cab drivers dont speak dutch?
I never met one. And I have taking a lot of cabs in and around amsterdam in my life.

Which mcdonalds are you talking about?

You’re completely wrong.

Hotel staff I dont know cause I dont stay in hotels in holland.

Amsterdam wrote:

Jetty wrote:

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

Amsterdam cab drivers, hotel receptionists and McDonalds staff often don't speak Dutch either so I guess it wouldn't be an issue.

What cab drivers dont speak dutch?
I never met one. And I have taking a lot of cabs in and around amsterdam in my life.

Which mcdonalds are you talking about?

You’re completely wrong.

I live in Amsterdam for 20 years and am definitly not wrong. Uber drivers dont’t speak Dutch ~20% of the time (I don’t have a car so average 30 rides a month). At many McDonalds not all staff speaks Dutch, Leidseplein i.e. Often Polish immigrants but have noticed this with African looking people as well.

Surely the extra cost of dead-heading crew with presumably higher accommodation costs / duty times - due to dead-heading will be quite high? Are UK based crews moving onto Dutch contracts earning Euros?

smi0006 wrote:

I assume these crew predominaly speak English? Out of curiosity how do KLM pax perceive them if they are unable to speak Dutch?

Perception-wise they are just as professional and normally very nice, just as the Dutch crews. But now I have an idea why on many flights to the UK the safety instructions were only in English - which at least was announced before.

Fly with the hoppers a lot and have no issues with non dutch speaking crew. Some cases the crew is mixed and you have both onboard. Some of the English crew even speak a little Dutch as do some cockpit crew. I like flying the hoppers there a nice bunch.