Air Zimbabwe in dire straits
Latest news is that Air Zimbabwe is in dire straits and will have to shed 500 jobs – a third of its workforce – to stay afloat. The fact that things are not well with Air Zimbabwe is no surprise to the few who use (or have used) the service.
A week or so ago a friend of mine arrived at Bulawayo airport to catch a flight to Harare only to find that the flight had been cancelled. The flight from Harare to Bulawayo arrives at 8pm in the evening, and then takes off to go back to Harare at 7am the next morning. You can imagine the annoyance of the passengers who had an extremely early start, arriving at 6am to comply with Air Zim requirements to be there an hour before the 7am flight takes off, only to be told there were too few passengers, that it was uneconomical, and the flight was cancelled. Presumably far too many passengers though, to be courteous and phone and warn them! Or maybe the airline can’t afford phone calls either…?
This was for a flight carrying a few people between Bulawayo and Harare. Imagine how uneconomical it is to fly a single solitary passenger all the way from Dubai to Harare! This apparently happened in 2005 and no, – I know what you’re thinking – it wasn’t Robert Mugabe! Had it been Mugabe, the plane would have been jam-packed with a stuffed-shirt entourage and shopping piled to the roof!
Another friend of mine, hearing about the abrupt Bulawayo-Harare flight cancellation, decided to call Air Zim the day before her planned flight to Harare to find out in advance if her flight had been cancelled or not. She was told that Air Zim ‘never cancels flights’. The outright lie annoyed her.
It is seriously galling to be led around by the nose by Air Zim staff, but I had an insight into their experience when I was in Gatwick once. Air Zimbabwe had not cancelled its flight, but it appeared to have double the number of passengers trying to cram onto the one flight I was also supposed to be on (they probably cancelled the flight the day before!). It was mayhem. Every other airline counter was orderly, passengers queuing and waiting their turn. The Air Zim counter looked like a circus, passengers pushing and shoving and shouting over heads, desperate to make sure they would get on that flight. It was incredible to me that Gatwick tolerated the craziness and noise.
The Air Zim staff, facing a seething mass of extremely angry people, seemed to give up. Luggage was hurled without being weighed (much to the relief of some I’m sure) onto the conveyor belts.They could barely look at the passengers. In spite of my own situation, I did find myself thinking that if I were them, in that situation, I’d probably pick up my coat and just walk out. But a job is a job – and how on earth can anyone endure that sort of thing day in and day out, and still be professional?
I didn’t make that flight. I was not reimbursed. I will never fly Air Zimbabwe again.
And I am not the only one who has had one too many bad experiences with Air Zimbabwe – everyone has a story.
Another chum of mine, a laid back easy-going type of gal, had decided that the cheaper flight prices offered at one time by Air Zimbabwe outweighed the risks she was constantly being warned about: “I have never had a bad experience” she declared, hearing all the moans. “You will one day”, I darkly assured her. And she did.
Her only trip overseas ended with a three night stay in a shabby airport hotel near Gatwick. Every day she and all the other passengers were bussed to the airport and were told to sit and wait on hard uncomfortable seats, all told they’d be flying out that day. But each night – for three nights – they were bussed back to the hotel. It was only when they finally boarded the flight that the passengers on her flight learned that Robert Mugabe had commandeered their flight to fly him and his entourage to some exotic destination, then wait there for him so they could pick him and his entourage up (plus shopping, I’m sure) and fly them back to Harare. Only then did the plane turn around and go back to Gatwick to collect the increasingly bitter passengers.
My friend commented that as awful as it was, it was made much worse when she realised that the staff must have known from the very beginning that there was no way in hell any of the passengers would be flying out on any of the days they sat and waited in the airport. “They lied to us each day to keep us there”, she moaned. “We could have had three days extra holiday…!”
My long-suffering friend will never fly Air Zimbabwe again either. I resisted the urge to rub it in and say “‘I told you so!”
So the news that Air Zimbabwe is in dire straits is no surprise at all. Customers don’t like being lied too; they don’t like paying for flights that don’t fly; they don’t like endless delays and cancellations and never knowing if, when they get to an airport, whether the plane will leave that day or not. Above all, passengers have resented being treated like dirt by Robert Mugabe, who seems to think its OK to use our national airline as his personal service, and for citizens to have their lives and travel plans put in limbo by his extreme arrogance.
On the question of what is or is not economical, Air Zimbabwe should also consider whether it is ‘economical’ for passengers to pay US$300 for a Harare/Bulawayo return flight. US$300!
I became curious and checked the British Airways website to see what they charge for flights between big UK cities and Heathrow. I wanted some kind of comparison with big expensive nations where people get paid more. My sense of perspective clicked in quite quickly when I saw them advertising £111 for return flights to Bordeaux (US$180) or £135 to Lyon and back (US$220)! As opposed to US$300 for a return flight between Harare and Bulawayo?!
No wonder Air Zimbabwe is going bust!
August 21st, 2009 03:05
May I add another experience.
Some years ago we had a visitor from the UK staying with us. She had a confirmed booking, Air Zim, to Kariba, leaving early in the morning. She arrived to be told that there were not enough passengers, and that the flight had therefore been cancelled. She ended up spending most of the day on a chicken bus instead!
But the real problem is the lying, for which there is no excuse.
August 21st, 2009 03:08
P.S. I am in Australla at present, and typical air fares between major cities, Perth to Adelaide for example, are A$78 one way – about U$60, if you book 10 days in advance.
August 21st, 2009 13:44
@David Wheeler – Corruption has its price.
August 25th, 2009 12:47
Whatever bad rep that the airline has, something drastic needs to be done to make sure that is does not die. It would be sucha shame for the nation to not have a national airline. Managers that actually care about the future of the airline and not their own personal gain would be good as a start.
August 25th, 2009 13:40
@Living Zim – Drastic indeed! I saw that one of the links in this post quotes an Air Zim guy as saying “Our 737 fleet is 23 years old and has outlived its economic life span,” he said. “The standard economic life span of an aircraft is about 15 years. Maintenance costs are high, spares for these airplanes are scarce,” . A friend of mine was at Vic Falls when one of the zhing-zhong planes had engine failure and had to land very quickly! No way do I feel OK flying Air Zim under those circumstances!
March 5th, 2010 00:04
The problem is that as a foreigner, Mugabe does not care. Why on earthwould Zimbabweans put him there when they have own people. Mubrandaya. he only cares for brandayas, not shonas, ndebeles or ndaus and manica. He has killed the country and his country man malawians have taken over almost everything. They eve have a whole batallion stationed in Zimbabwe.