Grounded carrier Go First has scaled down its resumption plans by around 30% than earlier after the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), in its audit of the airline, flagged issues such as lack of trained pilots and cases related to funding, refunds and spare parts.
In all, the DGCA has raised 13 observations in its audit report, pointing out the airline’s inability to resume operations at the scale it had proposed. The DGCA conducted a special audit of Go First’s facilities in Delhi and Mumbai from July 4-6 and inspected its parked aircraft in Bengaluru, Nagpur, Ahmedabad, Kochi and Kannur.
The airline’s resolution professional, Shailendra Ajmera, on Wednesday met senior DGCA officials and informed the regulator that the carrier proposes to resume operations with 15 aircraft and 114 daily flights. It will add more flights as and when operations stabilise.
In its pre-audit initial resumption plan submitted to the DGCA, the airline had proposed to restart services with 26 aircraft with around 160 daily flights. Go First had also proposed to fly to Leh and Thoise, but the DGCA found that the airline does not have the required number of trained pilots to fly at such high altitudes.
The resolution professional has told the DGCA that it now plans to start with five daily flights to Leh and three weekly trips to Thoise, instead of the earlier planned eight daily Leh flights and three weekly Thoise flights.Ajmera has also informed the DGCA that the airline has to process refunds of over `500 crore for flights cancelled till early June and has advance bookings of about Rs 110 crore.The DGCA has asked the airline how it plans to refund this money, to which the resolution professional has said travel agents will be allowed to book tickets using their money blocked with the airline. Passengers who booked directly will get refunds from fresh cash flow the airline will get from new bookings.
Of the total passenger cancellation amount, Rs 478.8 crore is for bookings through travel agents, and Rs 13.8 crore for those done directly through the company website or mobile app. Advance bookings of Rs 106.9 crore were through travel agents and of Rs 0.9 crore directly through the website or app.Go First, which filed for voluntary insolvency on May 3, has a total liability of Rs 11,463 crore. Of this, bank dues are of Rs 6,521 crore (Rs 1,300 crore has been drawn under the government’s emergency credit line guarantee scheme). It has committed a default of Rs 2,660 crore toward aircraft lessors and Rs 1,202 crore towards its vendors.