MYAirline Staff Still Fully Employed, Refunds To Be Paid Once New Investor Comes In

MYAirline is also in final talks of finding a new investor, says the Interim Accountable Executive.

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MYAirline has dominated conversations since it suspended operations abruptly last week on 12 October.

After losing their CEO and co-founder Rayner Teo who resigned due to health reasons, passengers were left dumbfounded when their flights on the morning of 12 October were cancelled because the airline has ceased operations.

It was recently reported that Interim CEO Stuart Cross had also resigned, leaving board member and former Department of Civil Aviation (now known as Civil Aviation Authority of Malaysia or CAAM) director-general Datuk Seri Azharuddin Abdul Rahman in charge as the Interim Accountable Executive.

CAAM had also suspended MYAirline’s operating licence effective 16 October.

Meanwhile, Transport Minister Anthony Loke said the airline had sold tickets for travel up to March next year with some 125,000 passengers affected by their abrupt suspension. He had said the ticket sales were worth over RM20 million.

So the questions lingering on the minds of many concern the refunds and fate of MYAirline’s employees.

Addressing these concerns, Azharuddin held a press conference yesterday where he assured that all of MYAirline’s employees are still fully employed, with no one placed under unpaid leave, as reported by The Star.

The question of when their salaries would be paid however remain up in the air as Azharuddin said they would only be able to pay once a new investor comes in.

Staff welfare remains our top priority. As soon as funding is secured, we will prioritise statutory payments and the staff’s September salaries. It is important to note that all staff members remain under MYAirline employment, with no one placed on unpaid leave or terminated to date.
Interim Accountable Executive Datuk Seri Azharuddin Abdul Rahman

What about passengers?

This is the same for refunds. While they have started the process of getting affected passengers to get in touch with them, MYAirline is not able to refund them yet.

Azharuddin said the refunds totalled RM22 million.

God willing, we will issue all the refunds and pay the salaries of our employees this year.
Interim Accountable Executive Datuk Seri Azharuddin Abdul Rahman

No back up plan

In commenting on why the airline had ceased operations abruptly, Azharuddin admitted that they did not have a back up plan to deal with their financial problems.

We issued the suspension notice at 5.30am on Thursday morning. While we promptly canceled the morning flights on Thursday, we acknowledge that some passengers on later flights were already at the airport, and this was an oversight on our part.
Interim Accountable Executive Datuk Seri Azharuddin Abdul Rahman

He said they did not see it coming as they were let down by investors pulling out at the very last minute on 11 October.

They came a few days before and talked to us but on that day (11 October) at 4.30pm, they just said ‘no deal’ and left us in a lurch. This situation arose due to our lack of a contingency plan, compounded by a last-minute investor withdrawal.
Interim Accountable Executive Datuk Seri Azharuddin Abdul Rahman

As such, he said they were not able to provide a timeframe on when operations would resume. He did however say they were in the final stages of talks with new investors.

According to Azharuddin, the airline would swiftly refund impacted customers and pay the wages of its staff once it has obtained new investors.

Tears On TikTok

Some of MYAirline’s employees shared videos on TikTok of their “last” flight which they recorded before actually knowing that it was their last flight.

@dewi.natasha Video kemarin untuk kenangan. Hopefully Myairline will fly high again soon✈️✈️ #myairline #cabincrew #fyp #gwenchana ♬ gwenchana imran bard – bukan nasuha

One employee on TikTok said they received an e-mail at 5.18am on 12 October asking them to “work from home”. She confirmed that they had not been terminated and they were still staff of MYAirline.

It was previously reported that security guards had gone on strike as they had not received their salaries.

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