Kenya Airways (KQ) expects passenger flights to resume earliest in September but with a low capacity, ending over five months of lost revenue due to Covid-19 pandemic.
The airline sees this as the best-case scenario, but cautions that the ultimate length of suspension of the passenger flight business is still uncertain.
The airline stopped international flights after a State order on March 22. The order effectively cut off Kenya Airways’ flow of new revenues at a time it had no cash reserves.
“There is reasonable expectation that the flights could resume in the third quarter of the year with business expected to have started at very low capacity and a gradual ramp-up, influenced by gradual lifting of travel bans, uncertain passenger confidence and health safety measures,” KQ says in its latest annual report.
The airline says that discussions with key industry stakeholders are on in relation to safe return to passenger routes. It is expected that the airline will be able to cover its variable costs on resumption.
While Kenya Airways plans to reopen passenger flights, Covid-19 tests and SOPs will not be ignored as all passengers planning to board the airline on flight numbers; KQ100 Nairobi to London, KQ760 Nairobi to Johannesburg & KQ538 Nairobi to Lagos will be subjected to mandatory tests. Kenya Airways has arranged for covid-19 test at any Lancet Kenya testing facility at a cost of KES 8,000.
Guests will therefore be required to proceed to any Lancet Lab for testing within 72 hours of the flight.
Prior to the test guest are required to provide consent for result to be shared with Kenya Airways medical team and result must be received 12 hours before flight bearing in mind that results take upto 24hrs to be processed.
Guests are also required to present a copy of covid-19 medical results at the check in counter and the results must be negative.
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