Airzim must shape up or ship out Air Zimbabwe
Air Zimbabwe has to do something about its delays if it is to perform profitably

Air Zimbabwe has to do something about its delays if it is to perform profitably

Lloyd Gumbo Mr Speaker, Sir
On a Wednesday a fortnight ago, our Air Zimbabwe flight was supposed to take-off from the Harare International Airport at 9:30am for the Victoria Falls International Airport in what was supposed to be a one hour flight meaning that we should have touched down at 10:30am. After checking in about an hour earlier as is required, an official came in around 9:45am to announce that the flight had been delayed, as such, take-off would be at 10am but we ended up taking to the skies at 10:30am.

In short, arrival time became departure time. The official mumbled the reasons for the delay. Someone next to me said: “We will be lucky to leave at 10am because the last time we ended up leaving at 2pm on the same flight.” Mr Speaker Sir, hardly a week passes without an article in a newspaper or on social media discussing the issue of Airzim delays and their impact on the airline and travellers.

One of the cardinal rules of the aviation industry is that punctuality must be of utmost importance to those who are in charge of flights because it is considered a key performance indicator since no traveller would want to risk delays by booking flights on an airline that does not value punctuality.

While there are generally three main reasons for flight delays – network planning and control, aircraft availability as well as ground operations and departure processes, it is the ground operations and departure processes that have been Airzim’s Achilles heel.

Mr Speaker Sir, some of the reasons for Airzim’s poor performance in the market have been as a result of its flights management where delays have become the order of the day.

A proud national airline must not be synonymous with delays because it is not good for the aviation industry where there is competition with other airlines that are punctual.

Yes, flight delays are not unique to Airzim because other internationally-renowned airlines also face delays here and there but the biggest problem arises when delays become a culture of one airline as in the case of our national flag carrier.

The effect of this is that passengers including Government departments end up shunning the national airline for other reliable airlines.

This is evidenced by recent media reports that Airzim allegedly flew one passenger from Johannesburg to Harare on one of its flights.

Given the volume of air traffic and passengers on the same route on a daily basis, one cannot give any other explanation as to why the national airline had to fly one passenger besides the fact that passengers shun it because of its unreliability.

Worse still, the parastatal has no competitive advantage in terms of airfares because it has allowed other airlines including those on domestic routes to dominate the pricing regime instead of turning it into their competitive advantage.

Mr Speaker Sir, what would attract a passenger to book an unreliable flight especially when there is no competitive benefit such as significantly cheaper airfares than the competitors?

Unreliability is an inconvenience that Airzim cannot afford in this era of competition where even private airlines have been rightfully allowed to ply domestic routes.

What is crystal clear is the fact that the airline’s delays have not only cost it in terms of passengers shunning it, but the Government-owned parastatal has had to book passengers into hotels after cancellation of flights as is the international norm.

This has been happening in Victoria Falls where the runway lighting was said to be very poor to the extent that it was risky to take-off after 5pm particularly in winter yet normally the Airzim flight must take-off from Victoria Falls International Airport at 4pm.

The reason the flight ends up failing to take-off at the scheduled 4pm is usually because of unnecessary delays that the airline has been accustomed to.

This results in it being holed up in Victoria Falls till around 5pm and subsequently cancelled flights and the airline having to fork out thousands of dollars in hotel accommodation for passengers who sometimes will be in their hundreds given the fact that a number of Government and continental events take place in Victoria Falls with at least 100 delegates from Harare flying there on Airzim.

So when Airzim cancels its return flight, it has to book the same passengers in their hundreds into hotels because organisers of whatever events cannot bear costs for someone else’s problems.

The world over, punctual airlines are more profitable than unreliable ones which should set a clear goal for operations for Airzim if it is serious about sustaining its existence in the aviation industry.

Yes, introducing international flights for Airzim will be a welcome development but as long as operational matters are not addressed, that decision would prove costly as it would be inevitable that the Airbus could fly all the way to or from Beijing with less than 30 passengers given the perception passengers have about the national airline.

The other problem is that when we introduce more regional and international flights, some passengers may be hesitant to fly Airzim for fear of missing their connecting flights.

This is the reputation that our national airline has created for it.

Mr Speaker Sir, a lot of money can be invested into the national airline and new routes introduced but as long as the culture of business as usual where delays are the order of the day, Airzim will remain the most undesirable airline and passengers will continue to shun it.

It is therefore important that Airzim does something about its delays if it is to perform profitably. It must either ship up or ship out. What authorities must accept is that the problems at the national airline are not necessarily to do with equipment or aircraft, but ground operations and departure processes that have resulted in the national flag carrier losing passengers to competitors.

It is therefore important that Airzim reclaims its market share in the domestic and regional markets on lucrative routes that connect Zimbabwe with other countries.

It is high time authorities at the national airline were held accountable for the poor performance of the parastatal because some of the reasons it has failed to perform have been as a result of a business as usual mentality by those in charge.

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