PAL Express plans to acquire nine smaller aircraft for its inter-island route expansion, its top executive said.
“We are in the process of deciding whether smaller jet or turbo-prop aircraft, so we would be evaluating and maybe in the next four months, we’ll be ale to decide,” PAL Express president Bonifacio Sam said.
“We are developing, expanding domestic routes, increasing our frequency and increasing also our capacity. So, we will focus on the domestic. Right now, we’re doing the Cebu hub. We’ll come up with at least 100 flights out of Cebu, inter-island flights,” he added.
The airline also plans to increase its Airbus aircraft from 13 to 17 by the end of the year.
Philippine Airlines in 2013 transferred most of its domestic flights to PAL Express, except Davao, Cebu and General Santos.
PAL Express carried 4.70 million domestic passengers in 2015 from 5.13 million passengers a year ago.
Its parent firm PAL flew 1.67 million passengers last year from 793,512 in 2014.
PAL, now wholly-owned by tycoon Lucio Tan after he bought back a 49-percent stake that San Miguel Corp. purchased from him in 2012, posted a comprehensive income of P6.55 billion in the first nine months of 2015, up from P169.1 million in 2014.
PAL Holdings attributed the sharp increase in comprehensive income during the period to strong revenues, which rose 10.8 percent to P81.98 billion from P73.98 billion in 2014.
PAL’s passenger revenues rose 12.5 percent to P68.37 billion in the first nine months of 2015 from P60.78 billion a year earlier.
PAL earlier asked the Foreign Affairs Department to help resolve a dispute with the Kuwaiti government over fifth freedom flights.
Fifth freedom is the freedom to pick up passengers and cargo from a foreign country and carry them to a second country, which is the final destination.
The rights are granted under the Philippine-Kuwait Bilateral Air Services Agreement of 1977, as amended in April 1995 and February 2009.