Finnair is number one for Convenience of the 20 airlines operating to Japan, according to readers of the Japanese travel guide ‘Chikyu no arukikata’. The Japanese travel guide invited readers who bought air tickets through its service website to participate in an airline survey between April and September 2005. A total of 2,619 participated in the survey which is conducted every five years.

Convenience was one of eight categories in the survey. Finnair was also second in the safety and reliability category, as well as for service and hospitality. Fourth place was achieved for food and drink, and sixth for aircraft and other facilities.

Finnair’s overall position in the survey was a commendable fourth place, behind Singapore Airlines, Virgin Atlantic and KLM. This represents a significant improvement on the position achieved in the previous survey in 2000, when Finnair came 14th.

Finnair currently flies to Tokyo and Osaka in Japan. In June it will launch a direct scheduled service to Nagoya.

The timetables of Finnair’s Nagoya flights allow for the shortest connection times via Helsinki to 30 cities in Europe.

Next summer Finnair will have a total of ten weekly flights to Japan: five times a week to Osaka, twice a week to Tokyo and three times a week to Nagoya. Finnair is the only airline in Northern Europe to offer direct connections to all three of the largest cities.