Demand for forward NorthLink bookings ‘doesn’t match dialogue around subject’
Stuart Garrett said just 30-35 people requested to book for 2026 in advance
NORTHLINK is not seeing the interest in bookings for the next year “that matches the dialogue around the subject”, its managing director has said.
Passengers have previously called for the ability to be able to book sailings for the next year well in advance, with the schedule for January onwards often only opened up late in the previous year.
However NorthLink’s managing director Stuart Garrett said that the demand for forward bookings did not align with the amount of discussion on the topic.
Garrett said that passengers could already register interest in 2027 bookings, for instance if they were travelling over the New Year period.
But he said that just between 30-35 people registered such an interest in travelling at the start of this year before bookings were opened.
Garrett said he believed the discussion about being able to book further in advance was a “non-issue”.
He was asked at Tuesday’s external transport forum if NorthLink could take bookings for 2027 and then refund – or uplift – fares for passengers if there was any difference in their invoices after NorthLink announced its latest fare costs later in the year.
Forum chairwoman Moraig Lyall likened it to the recent example of the Scottish Government deciding to scrap peak and mid-fares for islanders travelling on the service.
In that case, people who had already booked travel and paid higher fares were refunded for the difference.
However Garrett said people could already request that space be held on NorthLink ferries in 2027 – and that they were not seeing much demand.
“We’re not seeing anything like the volume of interest that matches the dialogue around the subject,” Garrett said.
“It’s a non-issue as far as we’re concerned.”
The issue was directly raised with first minister John Swinney last August, who declared himself “dumbfounded” that passengers in Shetland could not book sailings for 2026.
Less than two weeks later, the Scottish Government opened up bookings on the NorthLink ferries from January onwards.
Then transport minister Fiona Hyslop said last year that the hold-up in opening bookings was to await the release of May’s Consumer Prices Index (CPI) rate, so the government could decide on the fares for the coming year.
However with the CPI announcement made on 18 June, passengers were still being made to wait to book travel until 1 September.
Hannah Mary Goodlad, during her election campaign to be Shetland’s new MSP, said that transport was her “number one priority” during her campaign.
She said she raised “booking calendars” and “cabin availability” as two issues with the NorthLink service in September 2025.
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