‘Better service, better returns’

Biman Bangladesh Airlines has planned to expand its business in a bid to make a yearly turnover of Tk 9,500 crore, from the current Tk 6,650 crore, said Biman Managing Director and CEO Zahid Hossain yesterday.

"We want to establish and run Biman as a commercial entity like any other commercial airline – which is the biggest challenge in itself," he said while speaking at a press meet at Biman's headquarters in the capital's Kurmitola.

He said customer service and luggage handling services of the national flag carrier aren't at the expected level. "There are opportunities to improve Biman's customer service."

"Why will people buy our tickets if we can't provide services as per their expectations?" he also said.

"Passengers will increase and the business will grow if services are improved," he added. "We've asked our cockpit and cabin crew to be more cordial with passengers on board, treating them with respect and humanity."

He said at present, the national airliner makes a yearly turnover of USD 700 million. "But we want to increase it to USD 1 billion by expanding our business."

Zahid said, "In a bid to expand our business, we'll make the optimum use of our existing 21-aircraft fleet. The routes will be expanded to new destinations including the USA. We will also increase the number of flights on different in-demand routes."

On Biman's luggage handlings service, he said there is a workforce shortage for ground handling services, as there has been no recruitment in this section for a long time. The organisation will start the recruitment process soon.

TORONTO ROUTE GETTING GOOD RESPONSE

About Biman's newly launched Toronto flights, Zahid said they are getting good response from passengers.

Regarding serving alcohol to passengers on Toronto flights, Zahid said they are thinking of diversifying their inflight entertainment system and food menu. He, however, refused to elaborate on this topic.

On the issues of back-to-back accidents in front of Biman's hangar in April and June at Dhaka airport, Zahid said supervising failure is to blame for those incidents.