On Monday and Tuesday, Vistara flight cancellations stood at around 50 each day. On April 3, around 20 flights were cancelled.
“We’ve made cancellations (two to three days in advance) up to April 10. Over this weekend, we hope to close the entire operations for the month of April. There might be a curtailment and operations (in May), but it’s something that is planned,” Kannan told CNBC-TV18 Managing Editor Shereen Bhan.
Kannan further said the airline is willing to hear its pilots out and is keen on arriving at a middle ground, including addressing pilots’ concerns, manageable rosters, and hiring and training more aviators.
“We had a few operational disruptions. For example, we had bird strikes, and we had some aircraft down for maintenance. And we also had some ATC delays. Now, when such things happen, it affects the rosters of the pilots, and the rosters get broken up. And since we did not have enough buffer or standby, we were not able to crew the flights fast enough,” Kannan said on the flight cancellations.
The Vistara CEO conceded that the company could have handled the situation better. “I think on a planning level we should have done better. We were a lot more aggressive perhaps than we should have been,” Kannan said.
The heart of the matter lies in the revised salary structure. As Vistara prepares for its merger with Air India, it introduced new contracts aimed at aligning pilot pay with Air India’s standards. However, this move triggered discontent among many Vistara pilots, especially with an HR memo issuing an ultimatum to pilots to accept the new contract.
Sources said that junior pilots highlighted concerns about the new payment contract, which reduced their minimum flight allowance to guaranteed pay for 40 hours instead of 70 hours earlier. Earlier this week, several pilots were reported to have called in sick, leading to flight cancellations.
However, Kannan said the number of pilots calling in sick is on par for this time of the year. “The amount of sick leave that has been mentioned in various media reports. I again have to clarify that it’s nowhere significantly higher than what usually happens during this part of the year.”
Also read: Pilots’ unions call on Tata Group Chairman to address grievances — here’s what they wrote
On the new contracts, Kannan said, “We believe that the majority of the pilots, as long as they fly the same number of hours as they’re flying now, we’ll be better off with the new contract. Having said that, I know that it’s not about averages. It’s not about medians. We have to talk about each and every pilot and each and every staff member.”
Kannan said the airline reached out to pilots who had apprehensions and concerns and held a town hall with them. as well.
“The (HR) communication… was essentially to clarify that if pilots do not sign up for the new contract, they will not be transitioned into it and therefore into the merged entity,” Kannan said, elaborating on the HR memo that suggested pilots who don’t sign the new contracts have no recourse.
Two airline unions have written to Tata Group Chairman N Chandrasekaran, alleging that the concerns expressed by the Vistara pilots “are not isolated incidents but rather indicative of systemic issues that extend across various Tata Group aviation entities.”
“The issues of 70-hour fixed remuneration, approval of leaves, adequate rest periods, an unstable roster, stretching pilots to max flight duty, botched roster practices and unsupportive work environments are consistently echoed by pilots across different Tata Group airlines,” the letter added.
Kannan acknowledged that the increase in the number of flights could have led to pilot fatigue. Vistara currently has 1,000 pilots.
“We’ve been flying more, and the utilisation (of pilots) is higher, which also means that the pilots are, to some extent, stretched a little bit more… I think there is definitely scope for us to hear more from the pilots. There’s scope for us to adjust this based on the feedback that we get from pilots. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do,” Kannan assured.
As for passengers affected by the cancellations, Kannan said the airline is doing everything in its power to win back trust and accommodate them.
“We are sending out individual emails to each of the customers affected. It’s not just about refunds; that’s something that we will, of course, do. We are also going to provide compensation for passengers who were delayed for long hours; we are also going to provide them with additional vouchers, which is a token apology from us,” he added.
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