Despite the increased travels that usually characterise festive seasons, domestic airlines are yet to witness any of such increases.
The airlines say the volume of patronage of air transport has not changed significantly during the Christmas season.
According to them, the numbers have been almost the same as expected for their fleets.
“Patronage has not changed; it has been as we expected, since we have reduced the flight schedules so the numbers for each flight is just enough to carry,” the Chief Operating Officer of Africa World Airlines (AWA), Captain Samuel Thompson told Citi Business News.
The CEO of Starbow Airlines, James Eric Antwi also alluded, “Patronage has improved but not so much; travelling to Kumasi and Tamale for instance has increased slightly but returning to Accra is not that encouraging.”
Citi Business News’ checks reveal that the airlines have equally adjusted their flight schedules for the holidays.
For AWA, Captain Thompson explained that the company has reviewed the schedules even though its services are still available to the travelling public.
“The trend we have seen is that people travel early in the morning compared to late in the afternoon; we didn’t go on break, we are still operating because people are traveling all the time,” he said.
Meanwhile Starbow Airlines didn’t fly on Christmas Day and is expected to go off again on January 1, 2017.
But the CEO tells Citi Business News all operations are on schedule in between those two days.
“We’ve been flying only that we have reduced our schedules on selected days. We didn’t fly on Sunday [December 25th] but we have since resumed until the 1st of January that we will go on a break and resume subsequently,” Mr. Antwi remarked.
–
By: Pius Amihere Eduku/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana