‘Past seven months have been bad for travel industry’

Travel Point had also arranged repatriation charter flights for Algerian and Bangladeshi nationals in the country, which had to be called off because of the temporary border closure.

The Embassy of Algeria intervened so that the flight could be allowed to take off, but the plane to Bangladesh will now need to be postponed.

“We had a flight with more than 200 passengers going to Dhaka on Tuesday, and another one on Wednesday, but they have been cancelled or at least pushed forward now,” said Khan.

“We had all of these people in our office, asking us to send them home straight away, but we admitted we were helpless. What is concerning is that all of these people have taken their PCR tests, so we need to see if the government will allow them to fly without taking the test again.”

Junaid Zaib, the co-founder of Precise Travel, another travel agency in the country, had about 100 bookings made during this period, but has to now find alternate methods to accommodate customers, particularly since some airlines have still not been informed about the suspension of flights.

Alternative route

“I have, for example, a customer flying from Kiev to Muscat while transiting in between, and I have been trying to get him an alternative route, but the airline does not know what to do, because they say they have not received any confirmation from the relevant authorities,” he further revealed.

“Obviously, I have to ask him not to board the flight, because he will not be allowed to fly forward from his transit point.

“The last seven months have been quite bad for the travel and the hospitality industry, so we hope this decision only lasts for the next few days,” Zaib said. “We have already begun taking bookings for next June, so people are hopeful the situations around the pandemic won’t last much longer, and the arrival of the vaccine will definitely help in that case,” Zaib further added.