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The Perils of PIA

Given the once-vaunted reputation of PIA, very few analysts are now either objective or positive about the airline’s performance. An airline is supposed to take passengers and cargo from one location to another, in safety, comfort and on time. As a corporate entity it is also supposed to earn profits and for the most part, PIA performs reasonably well on both counts. Then why is it that PIA gets a lot of flak from travelling passengers, mostly Pakistani nationals since it is increasingly clear that foreigners prefer alternatives and unless it is a package, say for the Maldives or for connections to Bangkok or Dhaka, they take PIA as an airline of least preference, even when journeying to Pakistan?

As an illustration of the point, one would like to relate events of Thursday April 30, 1998 when I took PK-314 from Karachi to Lahore at 06:00 am on my way to Islamabad after a few hours stay at Lahore. When I reached Lahore Airport at 2:30 pm to embark upon PK-303 at 3:30 pm I was told that the flight had been delayed till 5:55 pm because the aircraft had left Lahore late for Bahawalpur at 12:00 noon. Since I had time at my hands I decided this was as good an opportunity to test the system, so I requested the concerned traffic staff to put me on any earlier flight. There was no other flight in-between except Aero-Asia and their flight at 5 pm had been cancelled. However PIA had PK-728, an international flight, landing at Lahore and continuing onto Islamabad at 4:50 pm. It was quite possible to accommodate the 30 passengers on that flight. It could be done I was told, if the District Manager could speak to the Station Manager, who in turn would get permission from the Customs and Immigration. So with some difficulty I got through to Mr Arif Khan, the District Manager, who at least spoke to me, though his tone suggested that anything lower than the PM and the Punjab CM was far below his status or attention level. In any case he did speak to the Station Manager, Mr Azeem Zafar, who in turn cheerfully told me that it was entirely his fault and that I should blame him since he could have acted earlier and didn’t. Now the Customs and Immigration authorities were not available as it was past their office hours. For good measure I rang up the Director Marketing PIA, Mr Haider Jalal, in Karachi but couldn’t get through to him, first because he was on a long overseas call and then had to sit in on a Promotion Board. When I explained to his staff the urgency of the matter, they conveniently passed the buck. I was put through to the Passenger Sales Manager Mr. Abid Jaffery, who told me, again quite cheerfully that I was wasting his and my time, that Mr Arif Khan in Lahore was the man to contact. During all this time, the attitude of the PIA ground staff at Lahore was excellent, they were courteous and hospitable to all the passengers. I was personally in no real hurry but there were passengers who were thus discomfited at the delay and the inability of PIA to improvise even when a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) should have been in place. This was a singular case of lack of decision-making. Both the District Manager and the Station Manager should have been concerned about the delay but it was quite obvious they were not pushed. There must be a system within PIA that caters for such delays but quite obviously it was not functioning and the decision-makers on the spot were not pushed. Could it have happened to another airline? Maybe, but in the circumstances, the lack of decision-making is endemic to PIA and as it goes higher up the management ranks, it gets worse. For the record, it is still far better than what it was a couple of years ago where all major decisions emanated from the former PM’s very decisive spouse and/or his hand-picked minions in PIA, mostly for personal profit or rank nepotism.

What PIA needs is managers down the line who are professionally competent and will look to the airline’s betterment in the taking of decisions rather than depend for their livelihood upon their mentors. Decision-making must be decentralised, if every major decision is going to travel up the ladder then there is going to be lack of decisions viz (1) because of time constraints (2) because of the poor quality of senior managers and (3) because of a lack in their ability to take command decisions. Mr Arif Khan showed a total lack of concern, Mr. Azeem Zafar displayed quite nonchalantly that he couldn’t care less, yet all this time the lower staff was desperately engaged in pacifying irate passengers and looking after their comfort in order to waylay their anger and frustration. This clearly shows that while “Sifarishis” have infiltrated PIA in large numbers at every level, it is at the managerial level rather than at lower levels that the problems have multiplied to the airline’s detriment. The one single problem with PIA today is the large number of “direct entries” due to favouritism, political or otherwise. When any appointment is made for reasons other than merit and performance, the built-in institution trouble-clock starts ticking. Whatever Shahid Khaqan Abbasi does will come to nothing unless he weeds out these useless, inefficient managers who give PIA a bad name because they are incapable of concentrating on the requirements of their jobs.

For many years I have waxed eloquent about Emirates Airlines, an airline that came into existence because of PIA’s direct input (in fact the first-ever flight from Dubai to Karachi had a PK number). In efficiency or service Emirates compare favourably with Singapore Airlines, etc. For the last few years, Emirates has gone from strength to strength except for one crucial area where the deterioration is alarming. Emirates remains a first class airline in efficiency and service, its aircraft are brand new and they run on time. The food and the presentation are excellent but in one area the change is horrifying, the attitude of the cabin crew. Over the past three months, on at least four different flights, on four different routes, I have had the dubious distinction of seeing and receiving extremely efficient service alongwith studied rudeness. Mostly this discourtesy is confined to the British female cabin crew, to a much lesser degree to the South Asians and other nationalities among them, maybe it is inherent for the British to treat all other nationalities, except the cash-strapped Arabs, with contempt. Again it is quite apparent that the air hostesses in question were doing their job without caring a hoot what the passengers think, obviously they must have local mentors on the ground in Dubai guaranteeing their jobs, how else could they afford this rather deliberate insolent attitude? Once upon a time one believed that Emirates would sack any cabin crew if a passenger made a major complaint, now it is clear that these standards do not apply anymore. PIA had quite such problems during the previous regime, some “special” air hostesses could (and would) override even the MD (in one case even whipping out a mobile telephone so that the astounded MD could speak to her mentor) if he dared comment on their performance in the cabin since their jobs were aligned more with other “performance” on the ground. By and large these extra-curricular performers have been weeded out in PIA but one doubts it will happen in Emirates. If this was confined to the air alone it would be bad enough but rudeness is now becoming as endemic in Emirates even on the ground (as witnessed in London and Dubai). As happens to any other bureaucracy, Emirates is thus well on the way to becoming a symbol of service without a smile.

In contrast, whatever may be PIA’s other problems, and there are many, PIA’s staff is extremely courteous, in the air and on the ground, at least for the most part. Their service may be good or bad, depending upon the Flight Pursar mostly, the food may be indifferent and of average quality, depending upon the mood of the catering staff, the interior of the aircraft may be clean without being extraordinary, in one aspect please give me PIA anytime, that is courtesy and hospitality in the air and on the ground, within their limited means. Shahid Khaqan Abbasi does not have much to go on given the fine-picked carcass of a once fine airline that he inherited from the Zardaris but he has the element of good behaviour and attitude that he can build upon, provided he can make his managers accountable for decisions they should have taken and have not. PIA can be turned around, what it needs is a dedicated management crew looking to the airline’s benefit rather than their own.

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