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AIRLINES must be keen to seize opportunities to meet the needs of today’s society to be able to recover in the aviation business, including by plunging into the low-cost carrier (LCC) service segment.
According to the General Chair of the Indonesia Air Carriers Association (INACA), Denon Prawiraatmadja, said currently airlines are required to be able to serve the needs and preferences of the community. Thus, if the demand for LCC services grows, airlines must also follow the wishes of the community and prepare them well.
“The growing demand for LCC is also one of the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. People also expect flight services that are more affordable and can be adapted to their economic conditions,” he said.
Denon also asked the public not to worry about the issue of tariff and security wars because this has also been regulated by the policy of the regulator.
“If you are concerned about safety, predatory pricing, route monopoly so that prices become expensive, there are already regulations set by the Ministry of Transportation. Now it’s just a matter of airlines not being able to rebound from this pandemic and not being observant of the potential or future opportunities that people want,” Denon said, Friday (2/11).
As is known, this year’s Indonesian flights are again enlivened by the presence of airlines that enter the LCC segment during the COVID-19 pandemic. Previously, last year there was a new Super Air Jet airline that aired in the LCC segment.
Currently, TransNusa, which previously only served scheduled flight routes in eastern Indonesia, is also operating again with a new branding as an LCC airline.
According to the President Director of TransNusa, Bayu Sutanto, in 2022, his company will expand its network routes by operating on domestic routes other than the eastern region with a no-frills service model or what has been known as LCC.
The business change, he explained, was due to the changes in the LCC segment after the COVID-19 pandemic. In accordance with the business plan, TransNusa will operate narrow body jets as well as regional jets.
Meanwhile, for domestic routes, TransNusa will fly tourist destination routes such as Denpasar and Yogyakarta in addition to the routes that have been flown previously.
“This change in the LCC segment is because we see that in the future it will dominate more than the full service and medium service segments. We assess that the corporate and government segments that have been full-service customers will decrease in terms of travel demand because they are accustomed to online meetings since the COVID-19 pandemic,” he explained.
TransNusa will also use the COMAC ARJ21 aircraft from August 2022 to operate on flight routes that were previously served by ATR72 propeller aircraft. TransNusa’s operating services with this airline are planned to start in August 2022. [bisnis.com/photo special]
