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to win one’s support - to gain one’s support

to match rivals - to be able to compete (to be equal) to put forward a proposal - to make a proposal

customer survey - a work of colleting information about customers’ tastes and opinions in order to plan how to advertise or sell the product

time-scale - dates, schedule to circulate - deliver

findings - facts often presented as a statistic tight restraints - strict limits

to work round the clock (the clock round) - to work all day and all night check-in facilities - means to record one’s departure, or arrival at the airport check-in personnel - people recording one’s departure or arrival at the airport catering - providing meals and drink

to extract (results) - to take out, to get

Θ Orientair is a Hong Kong based airline serving destinations in the Pacific Basin, Asia and Europe. It is an independent company and is wholly owned by Mackenzie Smyth, one of the great Hong Kong “Hongs”. While competition on all Asian routes is particularly fierce, Orientair is currently more concerned about a drop in its market share on European routes.

The following extract is from the Orientair’s Fact guide. Read the guide.

Registered Office: Kai Tak International Airport,

Hong Kong

All figures relate to the financial year last ended.

Θ Exercise 1. Listen to the recording, fill in the gaps in the Orientair Fact Guide and answer the questions:

1.What is the company’s business?

2.What type of company is Orientair?

3.What is the company’s position on the market?

4.What is the company’s financial situation (according to the figures from the guide)?

Θ Exercise 2. Study this timetable. A business traveller in London wishes to book a seat on an Orientair flight to Hong Kong. Listen to the conversation with travel clerk and correct the details on the form below.

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A flight with a stopover a direct (or point-to-point) flight.

1) A return ticket ...

2)A one-way ticket ...

3)The inward journey ...

4)Book it now ...

e) A dated ticket ...

Θ On July 26th Stephen Lee, the Managing Director of Orientair, calls a management meeting to discuss the problems on the European routes. At the meeting are Marketing Director, Tony Chan, and Financial Director, Gary Marsh.

Read the dialogue

Lee: Well, I think we can agree that overall results for the second quarter are satisfactory.

Chan: I agree, Stephen. However, I must draw the attention of the meeting to the poor results on our European routes. While traffic and sales in the Asian Division are healthy, results for the European Division give us cause for concern.

Marsh: I’d like to add to that, Stephen. Our market share on the European routes has been declining at an average rate of 2% over the past three years.

Lee: Yes, we can see that from the statistics presented here. And the consequences ... ? Marsh: This loss of customers to our competitors is leading to a low and unprofitable load factor. Our planes are flying at 61% of capacity on European routes.

Lee: That’s only just above break-even point. It’s obvious we can’t allow this situation to continue. We have to look urgently at some ways of improving our market share and attracting more customers.

Chan: We all know that we can only win customer support by improving the quality of our service.

Marsh: Yes, there’s little we can do about improving our fleet of planes in the shortterm. And in any case, Cathay Pacific and BA will always be able to match us there. Lee: Tony, can you put forward any proposals for improving our service?

Chan: We’re currently looking at the results of a customer survey. Jimmy Mo, the Marketing Manager, is working on it now.

Lee: What about the time-scale?

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Now listen to this part of the conversation.

Θ Exercise 4. The meeting goes on to discuss time-scale. Listen to the recording and answer the questions.

1.What are the results for the second quarter?

2.What are consequences of market share declining?

3.What can be done to improve the situation?

4.What is Jimmy Mo working on?

5.When is the next meeting to take place?

6.When are Marketing Department’s recommendations and report to be completed?

7.When is Managing Director to receive a copy report and recommendations?

Exercise 5. Rewrite these phrases using expressions from the dialogue.

The total results. overall

a)I must tell meeting that ...

______________________________________________________________

b)The results are good.

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c)Our planes are flying about 61% full.

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d)Can you make any proposals?

______________________________________________________________

e)There’s little we can do about that now.

______________________________________________________________

f)We can only gain customer support.

______________________________________________________________

g)Could you deliver the findings to all Board members?

______________________________________________________________

h)We are working within tight financial limits.

______________________________________________________________

i)I look forward to seeing your recommendations not later than by August the 7th.

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