AirAsia Berhad urged to refund passengers of unapproved Jan 3 KK-Sibu flight
KUCHING: The state Transport Ministry has called on AirAsia Berhad to refund passengers who had purchased tickets for the unapproved flight from Kota Kinabalu (KK) to Sibu on Jan 3.
In view of the cancellation of the flight, minister Datuk Lee Kim Shin said the unapproved flight had caused unnecessary inconvenience to the public.
“After weighing the gravity of this matter, we do consider that this incident was indeed very unfair to the public. We hope this kind of mistake would not be repeated in the future,” he said in a press statement yesterday.
Lee explained that the cancellation of the flight was due to the flight being unapproved by the Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) and his ministry.
Based on the approved flight schedule and frequency, he said that there were no flights from Kota Kinabalu to Sibu on Jan 3 and that SDMC and his ministry had never approved such flight schedule.
“To follow through on the matter, both SDMC and my ministry have sought an explanation on this matter from AirAsia Berhad and both were duly informed through an e-mail.
“The e-mail dated Jan 3 said that due to their internal inadvertent oversight, the aforementioned flight was erroneously opened for sale to the public,” he said.
Lee also said that the e-mail stated ‘For kind information please, we are now prioritising in taking care of all passengers booked on the BKI-SBW-BKI flight today and are being provided with the necessary service recovery options’.
“The planning of flight schedule and frequency from Sarawak into Sabah and vice versa are being given special attention, taking cognisance of the current situation of Covid-19 in the state of Sabah by the state government,” he added/
Lee highlighted that on Dec 31 last year, his ministry had published in the local newspapers the details of the schedule and frequency of flights going into and out of Sarawak, as well as within Sarawak.
“This is to make sure that the public have sufficient information to properly plan their journey. We would also like to remind all airlines operating flights into and out of Sarawak, as well as within Sarawak to comply strictly with the flight schedule and frequency that had been approved,” he said.
Lee added that another very important reason for such action to be taken was that during the current Covid-19 situation, efforts were being made by the government to contain the spread of the virus in the state.
“The Ministry of Transport believes that the public are fully aware of this matter and hence would only book their flights based on the approved flight schedule,” he said.