Airline's increased profitability comes after a strong summer in which it attracted more business and leisure passengers

EasyJet raised its profit expectations for the full year after it attracted more business and leisure passengers and enjoyed a strong summer.

The budget airline said in a trading update that pre-tax profit for the 12 months to 30 September is expected to have increased by at least 48% to between £470m and £480m.

This compared with an earlier guidance in July of profit between £450m and £480m, and would be a sharp improvement on the £317m achieved in the previous year. It is also above analysts' forecasts of £465m profit.

Revenue per seat is expected to rise by around 6% in the full year after strong demand in July and August and despite the political unrest in Egypt. The update came as the UK's Civil Aviation Authority said it was satisfied with plans submitted by Gatwick airport to raise average charges by 0.5% above retail price inflation for seven years.

EasyJet's chief executive, Carolyn McCall, said she was "disappointed" with the increase.

"This is based on the airport's proposals and ignores those of the airlines who gave evidence to support a lowering in charges which would have led to a reduction in fares paid by passengers."

EasyJet has increased efforts to attract business passengers, which account for 18% of passengers, with the introduction of allocated seating, flexible tickets and more frequent flights on key routes.

Total passenger numbers increased by 4% to 60.7 million in the year ending September 2013.

"EasyJet has delivered a strong performance in the last 12 months due to management action to generate value to our customers and maintain a tight control of costs combined with an unusually benign capacity environment," said McCall.

EasyJet said its fuel bill in the first six months of the 2014 financial year was likely to be between £20m and £30m higher than during the same period a year earlier.

The airline has sold more than a quarter of seats in the first half of the year ending 30 September 2014, in line with the previous year.

EasyJet will publish its full-year results on 19 November.

Here are some of the things that have happened to my family over the last few weeks.

One of our neighbors watched all three of our children for several hours for free so that Sarah and I could work on a backyard project together and have a nice quiet dinner together.

Another neighbor loaned us some gardening equipment. Another friend gave us some seeds for our garden.

In one evening, four different people that live near us stopped to talk to me as I worked in the front yard. One of them invited me to a non-religious event hosted by his church. Another swapped some recipes with us. Another friend gave us a few coupons that were particularly useful to us.

Another friend of mine passed along a job offer.

These are just the interactions I could recall over the last week or two since the weather became nice enough to spend time outside.

All of these things came about because I put effort into getting to know my neighbors and make friends in the community. That effort takes time more than anything else, but over the long run it rewards me in countless ways.

Sometimes, that reward is purely social. At other times, it rewards me in a financial sense or in a time-saving sense. In either case, those relationships add consistent value to my life.

A side note: my belief is that online interaction hinders this kind of relationship building. Cell phones and the internet make it easier to just reinforce the close friends you already have and often doesn’t lead to face-to-face interactions and relationship building with new people.

So, how do you build these kinds of relationships?

The easiest first step is to meet your neighbors. Talk to them when you see them outside their home. When you see that they need help with something, offer to help. If someone new moves in, knock on their door and introduce yourself, ideally with a small housewarming gift.

Some people won’t interact with you and will avoid you. You can’t really help that. However, most people will interact with you in a positive way and you can build on that. Invite your neighbors over once in a while for a meal or for a drink. Look for things you have in common with them and build on them.

The other useful method is to get involved in community activities. What kinds of things are going on in your town? What kinds of community organizations exist? This takes some research, but it’s often worth it. Go to the library and to city hall to look for activity lists, group lists, and community calendars. Go to things that seem interesting. Talk to people when you’re there.

Eventually, you’ll begin to see the same people at events and, over time, you’ll get to know them. As with your neighbors, help them out when you can. Congratulate them on their successes. If you see something that would be useful for them, grab it and give it to them later (things like coupons and so on).

If you do this for other people, they’ll begin to do the same for you. Over time, you’ll build up a great collection of friends and neighbors who constantly come through for you when you need it.

You can often help others by just spending a bit of time and energy, but when they help you in return, it can often save you far more energy and time and money. The help you give almost always costs you less than the value of the help and friendship you’ll eventually receive.

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