Cebu Pacific Airlines is cancelling 116 domestic flights between May 1-10, reflecting 58 round-trip flights mostly from its Manila hub. According to local paper “Inquirer” this is part of the “ongoing effort to improve on time performance and reduce inconvenience” for the low-cost carrier’s passengers. While this might cause inconvenience for passengers affected, I think it’s actually a step into the right direction – find out more below!
Cebu Pacific has delievered the worst on-time performance in Asia and much of that is due to the overcrowded Manila hub and the stretched schedule for planes and personnel of the low-cost carrier. The lack of replacement planes and limited slack in the schedule results in small problems rippling through scheduled operations, resulting in long delays by day’s end and flight cancellations at the last minute.
It appears, that finally Cebu Pacific is making the necessary adjustments to their operations and starting to repair their damaged reputation. They are cancelling 116 domestic flights, mostly from their hub in Manila, and on routes that typically have multiple daily flights or flights to secondary airports. You can find the full list of flights here!
As with other flight changes or cancellation, you can chose to be rebooked on another flight within 30 days, reroute to alternative airports or get a full refund. With the busy Holy Week behind us, it shouldn’t be too difficult to find alternative flights.
I had a flight change recently and my experience with Cebu Pacific’s handling of the change was pretty good. They informed me via email and SMS, repeatedly, and I was able to accept the proposed alternative, change the flight or request a refund online.
I feel for the affected travelers – a change to an important itinerary can become a big problem. I do welcome Cebu Pacific’s decision to put some more slack into their operations schedule and have more planes available as back-up for the inevitable problems that occur in air travel. There will always be mechanical problems or weather delays, so airlines need to be prepared to handle them without constant delays or last-minute cancellations.