Local airline operators have cancelled hundreds of domestic flights and are expected to cancel more due to insufficient manpower.
A number of flight crew and support personnel have been exposed to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and have to undergo quarantine, the airlines said.
Cebu Pacific Inc. (CEB) has cancelled 144 domestic flights from January 6 to 10, while Philippines Airlines Inc. (PAL) has cancelled 124 flights from January 9 to 16, owing to manpower shortage due to rising cases of COVID-19.
Roberto Lim, Air Carrier Association of the Philippines (ACAP) executive director, told Malaya Business Insight, the airlines will request to the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) that the shortened period of quarantine and isolation imposed by the Department of Health (DOH) for health workers be extended to critical industries like transport. Otherwise, acute shortage of staff will halve operations, Lim said.
DOH’s new rules on health workers shortened the isolation period for the COVID-19 positive with mild and moderate symptoms from 10 days to five days, and zero quarantine for close contacts of COVID-19 positive persons.
Lim said ACAP will submit a proposal to the IATF to shorten the quarantine and isolation days of airline employees.
“Flight cancellations have started and it will increase further if the rules are not modified.
Without change in rules, airlines will run out of staff — a major disruption and inconvenience to the public,” Lim said.
ACAP members PAL, CEB and Philippine AirAsia Inc. discussed their proposal during a meeting last Sunday with Department of Transportation (DOTr) Secretary Arthur Tugade.
“DOTr Secretary Tugade understands this challenge faced by the sea, land and air sectors and is supportive,” Lim said.
PAL has advised affected passengers to avail any of the three options: to convert tickets to travel credits, rebook and refund tickets.
“We are taking the precaution of cancelling a number of PAL flights, even as our PAL teams do all we can to maintain as many other flights as possible, process all passenger requests and relieve the longer call waiting times and ticket office queues,” PAL said in a statement.
CEB is also offering flexible options for all domestic flights until Jan. 31, 2022. Affected passengers can rebook, refund and store the amount of ticket in a virtual CEB wallet.
AirAsia Philippines has elevated its internal health and safety protocol to avert flight cancellations.
AirAsia Philippines said it has established a Safety Plus 24/7 Team composed of different department leaders and the People and Culture-Medical team to strengthen its support and monitoring of the health and well-being of its employees.
