Budget carrier IndiGo Budget carrier IndiGo will reinstate salaries of pilots and cabin crew by another eight percent from August 1. The airline will also reinstate layover and deadhead allowances for pilots and cabin crew from July 31.
IndiGo has also launched a Forex Card for crews and Zonal Employee Discount (ZED) through which airline staff can travel on discounted tickets on partner airlines, the airlines said in an email to its employees.
While the largest airline in India is moving forward with the restoration of allowances for the pilots, it is yet to reinstate pre-covid salaries. The overall salaries of pilots and cabin crew have been reinstated by 16 per cent of pre-COVID salary.
Furthermore some allowances like night and over time allowances are also yet to be restored. IndiGo had introduced a 28 per cent pay cut in May 2020 due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The hike in salaries by IndiGo comes just a few days after the airline witnessed delays in its flights across the country on July 2 and July 3 after a number of its cabin crew took leaves. Salaries have been a difficult issue for IndiGo for the last few months as other domestic airlines in India had till now reinstated salaries of their employees higher than IndiGo.
India’s largest airline had in April raised the salaries of all its pilots by 8 percent, and had said that it would reinstate salaries of pilots by another 6.5 percent from November in case there are no further disruptions to the flight operations.
However, the airline's pilots were disappointed over the recent 8 per cent salary hike announced by the airline. Some of IndiGo's pilots had even threatened to go on strike in April but the airline had suspended the pilots who were planning to organise a strike.
IndiGo CEO Ronjoy Dutta on April 8 told employees through an email that raising salaries was a difficult and thorny issue but the airline would constantly review and adjust wages based on its profitability and the competitive environment.
Also Read: IndiGo to operate daily flights between Mumbai and Bahrain from August 1
“We are in an inflationary environment, we have gone through a very difficult period, first off pay cuts and then not full restoration of pay. But I will say this, our heart is with the employees. We want to do the right thing for them, we would love to give them more pay raises so our heart is with them, but our head has to work in terms of let's be profitable,” Dutta had said in an IndiGo earnings call in May.
Last week, a number of IndiGo's employees had taken last minute leaves on Saturday to appear for the walk-in interviews for hiring cabin crew by Air India and Air India Express.
Such incidents are only expected to rise in India in the coming few months with Air India, Akasa Air, and Jet Airways all looking to hire pilots and cabin crew for their operations.
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