South African Airways (SAA) has sold one of its three exclusive daily landing time slots at London Heathrow.

The announcement follows SAA's cancellation of its direct Cape Town to London flight, which is scheduled to take effect on August 15.

Theunis Potgieter, SAA General Manager Commercial, has confirmed the sale but the buyer or the selling price has not been made known.

“Slots at London Heathrow are operated on a use it or lose it basis; and the rights to use the arrival and departure slots are based on rights granted due to historic operations. Slots are not transferable between carriers and can either be leased, sold or will be lost if at least 80% of flights are not operated within a set schedule period,” he said.

Potgieter said the airline, with the guidance of the United Kingdom Airports Co-ordinator, publicly tried to rent out the slot with preference given to African carriers. This was, however, unsuccessful. Subsequently, through the United Kingdom Airports Co-ordinator, SAA publicly offered the slot for sale.

“An agreement was reached between SAA and a carrier. Due to contractual obligations, SAA is not in a position to disclose information pertaining to agreements reached between SAA and the carrier,” he said.

Potgieter explained that SAA had no restriction on the number of seats it operated on its twice-daily services and would be able to increase capacity on its current services if there was demand.

“Capacity can also be added via our codeshare operations in Germany if required. London Heathrow still has slots available at certain hours of the day.”

Potgieter said SAA still operated two daily flights between Johannesburg and Heathrow.