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Bangkok Airways considers more job losses and confirms fleet reduction
November 24th 2021
Bangkok Airways intends to reduce its fleet from 38 to 30 aircraft by 2022 and said it may have to make more cuts in staff numbers. Read More » Bangkok Airways president, Puttipong Prasarttong-Osoth, told the Bangkok Post the fleet reduction would help the financially embattled carrier reduce fixed costs by around 300 million to 400 million baht per aircraft each year. He also indicated the company would have to go beyond the 30% staff cuts implemented during the pandemic. He blamed the Thai government’s failure to provide soft loans to the industry that would have helped sustain employment for 20,000 staff in local aviation, as the basis for the downsizing. After the government failed to approve the loans, every airline has had to downsize or cut expenses to be in line with actual operations and existing fleet, he said. The airline suspended flights from July to August due to the downturn in passengers, but resumed some services in September. It reported a loss attributable to shareholders for the quarter ended September 30 of 6.98 billion baht (US$210.5 million) compared with 1.57 billion baht in the same quarter of 2020. Revenue for the three months declined 25.3%, to 672.3 million baht.
