Karachi, May 17: Management and employees of National flag carrier, PIA, are striving to bring back the lost glory of PIA by cutting costs where possible and bringing efficiencies in operations through regular consultation at all levels, this was stated by Capt Suhail Baluch while talking to journalists in Karachi.

Flanked by management representatives the President PALPA said that from the platform of JACPIAE the employees had announced that they will not leave any stone unturned to make the national flag carrier a national pride when the Federal Govt had agreed to their demand.

The newly appointed Managing Director PIA Captain Nadeem Yusuf Zai is a dedicated and hardworking employee of the airline who is not only standing by the employees in this quest but is also appreciating the different suggestions given by them and implementing the cost cutting measures suggested by the committee he formed for the purpose.

MD PIA Nadeem Yousuf Zai constituted a Cost-Cutting Committee and named President PALPA, Captain Suhail Baluch as Chairman of the committee giving a task of suggesting immediate cost-cutting measures to reduce the operational expenditures of the airline by utilizing all possible options including the scheduling of national and international routes and destinations within a controlled budget.

Capt Baluch said that Captain Nadeem having his hands on the pulse ordered to form this committee to immediately overcome the biggest problem of the airline and that was the financial bleeding; an airline which earns revenue of more than 100 billion was suffering losses due to inefficient planning of the previous regime.

He said that Captain Nadeem has already proven his skills as DG CAA where he managed to earn huge revenue for national exchequer.

He mentioned that there was a time when the national carrier was carrying out engine overhaul, not only for most of its fleets but for other international airlines. This practice has been outsourced. PIA can save at least Rs. 800 million a year if in-house overhauling is reintroduced.

Captain Baluch said that PIA already has an experienced executive Mr. Saleem Sayani who has huge experience on such projects and a good repute worldwide in this business, using his experience and his personality PIA can attract huge business of overhauling etc.

The experienced members of the committee have achieved a target of earmarking a saving of Rs 400 Million by making slight changes in planning of crew slip, cockpit crew and cabin crew patterns.

Flight purser Noor Leghari, a coopted member of the cost cutting committee, was given special credit that owing to his vast experience of scheduling rosters, huge budget of the airline has been saved as cabin crew and cockpit crew have been assigned the flights in the manner that they would not need to stay in hotels unnecessarily.

Previously, the PIA management used to spend millions of rupees only as the staying expense of cabin crew and cockpit crew in luxury hotels at different national and international destinations. The committee immediately reviewed flawed crew layover pattern and unrealistic contracts with some hotels that were costing huge sum of money to the airline which had entered into contract with hotels at different locations for accommodating its flying crew. PIA used to renew those contracts, signed years back, without assessing new ground realities. For instance, PIA had an agreement with Marriot London for 70 rooms per day at 75 British pounds (Rs. 10,425) per room while the normal room charges were 110 Pound (Rs. 15,290). The average daily occupancy of PIA staff at London was 80 rooms. For the additional 10 rooms, the PIA was paying full rent and bearing additional costs, a huge difference between the contract rate and actual rate. This amounted to Rs. 5.58 million additional expenses per year. A simple revision of contract for 100-110 rooms could have saved PIA a huge amount. Such flaws existed in contracts with hotels at both domestic and foreign locations that should have been renegotiated.

As per agreements with hotels involving domestic layovers with PSL (Pearl Continental/Marriott), PIA is supposed to pass the arrival timings of flights one week before. In the agreement, if arrival timings are passed 6 hours before, hotel charged previous night too i.e. one night extra.

For instance, PK-788 is scheduled to arrive at 05:45 am, the crew would reach hotel much later than 6.00 am but the hotel is notified to book the room at the time of arrival of the flight, the hotel charges two nights. Crew normally takes one and half hour to reach hotel after the blocks off. If the arrival timings are passed with +1 hours i.e. PIA will save 14 nights on these sectors.

Another saving was made possible that was ignored in many flights. For instance, PK-790 YYZ-LHE, Cabin Crew is entitled to get 36 hours of rest at LHE as per ANO. Same aircraft flies to KHI after one hour transit.  An option was floated with incentive programs to the Cabin Crew (as the option already exercised by the cockpit crew) to continue travel and save two nights per crew i.e. 28 nights in total which will also provide the same crew maximum time at their residence and availability/rest at home base.

The committee pledged to continue with its efforts to whither away extra or unnecessary expenditures for reducing operational cost of the airline and thanked PIA management and MD for showing complete trust on the members of the committee.

The committee has also suggested some measures in aircraft operations that all other airlines take to improve efficiency and cut costs without compromising the quality of air travel.

The committee has pointed out discrepancies in the operations that add unnecessary additional weight in the flights resulting in higher fuel consumption and depriving the airline of the capacity to take additional cargo.

For instance, each of the PIA aircraft carries a flying pack weighing approximately 1 ton. This contains the spares like wheels and other components that the plane might need in case of faults found during the flight. Almost all of these parts could only be replaced after the aircraft has landed at its destination. This extra weight could be avoided by keeping the flight pack components at the landing stations. There could be a flying pack of each type of aircraft at each of the airport where that type of plane lands.

This will reduce the weight of the aircraft by 1 ton without compromising the safety of the carrier. All other airlines are practicing this procedure wherever possible. The airline could then use the additional 1000 kgs for cargo or in case the cargo is not booked, the plane would use less fuel due to lighter weight.

In the same manner, each of the PIA aircraft, when it takes off, carries full load of drinking water without considering the number of passengers on board. It should be made mandatory to fill the tanks according to the strength of the passengers. It is useless to carry 1 ton additional water if the aircraft is carrying half the number of passenger than its capacity.

This practice would also save fuel of the aircraft.

The airline, according to its sales record, is generating only Rs. 5 billion from cargo uplift. This amount can be doubled if the managerial and higher cadre takes pain. After creating extra space for cargo, the revenues would be doubled.

Technical staff rues that even in this modern technological age all PIA aircraft carry heavy repair and maintenance manuals weighing over 40 kg.
The airlines world over carry these manuals as electronic flight pack in their laptops.