BANGKOK, 18 November 2019: Thai Airways International has accumulated a massive loss of THB10.9 billion for the nine months of 2019, January to September.
According to the airline’s report to the Thailand Stock Exchange, the third-quarter continued the negative trend with a net loss of THB 4,680 million.
Airline president Sumeth Damrongchaitham described the situation as “normal for airlines facing fierce competition,” according to the Bangkok Post report at the weekend.
For the third quarter, THAI reported revenue of THB 45,016 million, which decreased by THB 2,937 million or 6.1% compared to the same period last year.
THAI managed to reduce third-quarter expenses to THB 47,858 million, which was THB 4,029 million or 7.8% less than last year.
It reported a third-quarter decline in production traffic (ASK) of 3.7% and passenger traffic (RPK) decreased by 0.6%.
However, the average cabin factor reached 80%, up from 77.5% during the third quarter of 2018. The airline carried 6.06 million passengers up 0.8%.
The airline president argued that globally, airlines were incurring losses as a result of the world economic situation, ongoing highly aggressive market competition, technological disruption, and political unrest.
However, experts point to other factors such as THAI’s unwieldy workforce estimated 25,000 staff (double Singapore Airline), below par aircraft utilisation, faulty pricing models and the growing strength of the Thai baht against the US dollar and Euro.
Looking at the fourth quarter, the airline says it continues to cut expenses, including the postponement of unnecessary investments and the reduction of employee benefits at all levels.
THAI also has plans to increase revenue from e-commerce, which will be launched later this year.
It is a pity, once it was such a perfect airline.On many flights crew don’t take any attention of their guests. I used to travel a lot between Chiang Mai -BKK but too many delays by TG.Happy with Thai Smile and other airlines.
is anyone surprised? TG flights are much more expensive than other regional carriers, long haul service is lower quality than SQ, they don’t have daily schedules on many legs, and they don’t have a working website for speedy purchase of tickets. Even their recently launched app fails to work. They don’t even reserve a portion of front cabin economy seats for their priority members.