Eurotunnel takes axe to freight shuttles

AILING Eurotunnel is slashing the number of freight shuttles it puts through the Channel Tunnel in a desperate bid to turn round its lossmaking, debt-laden business.

From 1 January, Eurotunnel is cutting the number of such services from 71,000 to 60,000 a year, a reduction of more than 15%.

The move is not only a bid to cut operating costs and ensure some of trains are not running half empty but also an attempt to shore up the fares it charges truckers. The bid to keep up its yields is a central part of the new French management's Project Dare programme to turn the business round.

By cutting the number of shuttles, it hopes its most regular and loyal trucking customers will sign long-term arrangements to bag their position on the trains - a deal that will work against truckers who use the tunnel as an 'insurance policy' when they cannot get across the Channel by ferry because of bad weather. Those irregular users could see one-off fares more than double.

But the plans could easily backfire, it is being warned. Some of Eurotunnel's proposed fares may see 'loyal' customers sometimes having to pay 25% more and that alone could send regulars on to the ferries, which have been engaged in a damaging price war in recent years.

Eurotunnel, run by a cabal of French businessmen after the ejection earlier this year of its British executives, has launched further attempts to renegotiate payments of its £6.4bn debt.