Biman Bangladesh Airlines has issued two ‘Requests for Information’
for ground and cargo handling by foreign companies.
The national flag carrier invited information from major airlines, cargo or courier handling agents for a joint venture in cargo handling and sales or marketing with Biman at any or all international airports in Bangladesh.
Biman managing director Kevin Steele on Tuesday told a press conference that there has been a lot of misunderstanding on the RFIs.
Clarifying the confusion, he said this is an initial RFI only. ‘We will not proceed further until the ministry of civil aviation and tourism, the Biman Board and the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh have been apprised of the results of the RFI.
He said the RFI joint venture will be 100 per cent owned by Biman. At the end of the contract period, all assets including new equipments will revert to Biman ownership.
‘The Biman staff will also be benefited enormously from this project and no Biman staff will be made redundant due to the joint venture, no staff will have any cut in salary or benefit, rather many new staff will be recruited and some staff will actually receive more money,’ he added.
The national flag carrier held the press conference to unveil its new website on its own premises.
About the new website, he said that Biman has the platform to launch all the products and services that people would see on any world class airline website. These include pre-reserved seats towards the end of July, booking special meals end of August, frequent flyer scheme by October and online check-in by December.
Biman is offering a total of 2,000 seats on any route, in any class of travel, booked through the website and at a 50 per cent discount before tax, he added.
Kevin underscored that ‘the punctuality in June 2013 continued to improve and we saw on-time punctuality over 60 per cent for the first time in four years whereas around 19.5 per cent was in June 2012’.
About the carrying of pilgrims this year, he said that around 45 thousand pilgrims will be carried by Biman this year.
A total of three aircraft would be added to Biman on lease to carry the pilgrims. Of them, two aircraft have around 50 seats each and one aircraft has around 250 seats.
Moreover, Biman has already taken many steps to ease the Hajj scheduled flights, he added.
-With New Age input
