Daily Times

CEO Pakistan International Airlines, Air Marshal Arshad Malik said the national flag carrier has seen a 41% increase in revenues, 5 points increase in seat factor and over 90% reliability of schedule. PIA has achieved unprecedented numbers of performance and is all set to take more aggressive course.

Signs of improvement have started to appear in PIA in just one year’s time, though there are still many challenges to overcome and more new heights to achieve. Air Marshal Arshad Malik shared these future plans, achievements and challenges in a video message.

Highlighting the airline’s one year’s performance, he said that PIA’s revenue during the past six months had increased by 41 percent, seat factor also improved and was now between 80 to 84 percent which is considered a good performance indicator in the Aviation Industry.

Notably, the airline’s cargo space utilization has increased from 20 percent to almost 80 percent. PIA also enhanced its engineering capabilities and now aircraft maintenance i.e. line maintenance and Check A can be performed at Lahore and Islamabad. This facility was previously only available at Karachi. This allows for better positioning of aircrafts and maintenance which leads to cost savings.

He said two aircraft that were grounded since long, were made serviceable this year and now all Boeing 777s and A320 aircraft in PIA fleet are operational and contributing towards revenue generation. A proper aircraft spares inventory planning program which was lacking before, has also been implemented in PIA that has reduced aircraft down time and better serviceability of aircraft. He said that the ground service equipment which plays an important role for any airline was left neglected in the past.

The ground service equipment that was left as scrape has been overhauled utilizing the airline’s own resources thus saving millions which was previously given to other service agencies. PIA renewed its IOSA certification this year and is now in the process of attaining EASA certification. PIA’s property assets in Pakistan and abroad were neglected and abandoned in past, this year the administration identified these properties in USA, Amsterdam, Iran, Tashkent and other countries and are trying to make better use of them.

He further added that merit has been implemented in PIA and all promotions and foreign postings have been done purely on merit without any outside influence. Also, he thanked the Government for giving their full support in this regard. Referring to overstaffing in PIA, he said that majority of the airline operations are from Islamabad and adjoining cities while most of the Human Resource was based at Karachi. Terming the Human Resources in PIA as an Asset, he said that now employees have been positioned according to the size of operation & number of flights number of fights that are operating from Islamabad.