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Vistara sends senior employees on leave without pay for 4 days in May, June
Earlier, the airline sent its employees on compulsory leave without pay for three days between April 15 and April 30 as a measure to preserve jobs and conserve cash flow.
Vistara airline on Tuesday decided to send its senior employees on leave without pay for up to four days for the months of May and June as the airline battles the coronavirus crisis and the economic fallout resulting from a nationwide lockdown in place till May 17.
The airline said that all employees except pilots would have to accept the compulsory no-pay leave.
“With the latest lockdown extension, our operations continue to be suspended until the date, prolonging the period of no-revenues as well. Vistara is making every effort to save jobs of more than 4,000 of its people while conserving cash and pursuing to reduce operational expenditures, which includes staff costs.
“For the months of May and June, Vistara’s senior staff will take compulsory no-pay leave of one to four days in each of the two months, depending on employment grades (four days for senior-most employees). The monthly base flying allowance for pilots has been reduced to 20 hours for these two months, and adjustments will be made to their monthly remunerations accordingly,” said an airline spokesperson.
This decision does not impact 70% of Vistara staff, including cabin crew, other frontline staff and junior corporate office employees, the spokesperson added.
Soon after the lockdown was extended, the ban on domestic and international flight operations too was extended in line with it.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said the foreign and domestic airlines will be informed about the opening of their operations in due course.
Since April 15, Vistara has operated more than 20 cargo flights using Boeing B787-9 and carried 140 tonnes of commercial and relief cargo.
Earlier, the airline sent its employees on compulsory leave without pay for three days between April 15 and April 30 as a measure to preserve jobs and conserve cash flow. The lockdown at that point in time was set to end on May 3.
At the time, Vistara said it had to make the difficult decision of “further reducing our staff costs with the objective of preserving jobs”.
The exercise was carried out at three levels. The first grade was to take 3 days’ leave without pay, the next grade level had to take two days’ leave without pay and then the third grade had to take a day off with no pay.
On March 27, the airline had also introduced compulsory leave without pay for up to three days between April 1 and April 14 for the same set of senior employees.
