Improving PIA’s service: ‘Perk up in-flight menu, entertainment’

Senate standing committee stresses a third-party evaluation should be conducted to improve service standards.

ISLAMABAD: The Senate standing committee on culture and tourism on Saturday directed the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) to revise its on-board menu and in-flight entertainment, questioning the current sub-standard offerings.

“PIA’s standard and quality of entertainment programs and the food served on flights has gone down the drain and is in a very pathetic condition,” said Nilofar Bakhtiar, chairperson of the standing committee.

Expressing dissatisfaction, the chairperson directed PIA to improve its performance while dealing with flight delays, especially the provision of food in such circumstances. She informed the committee that she had recently filed a complaint with chairman PIA regarding a flight that was delayed in China for 24 hours. Stranded passengers, who had to endure freezing weather, were not properly looked after and were served meager quantities of sub-standard food. The airline did not even have milk and sugar for the stranded passengers, she added.

Member of the committee, Senator Pervez Rashid stressed that a third party evaluation should be conducted to improve the standard of in-flight food and entertainment. He said a weekly evaluation report should be given to the media about the improvements being made in the airline’s services.

The committee also directed PIA to improve its services on all routes saying that some routes, on which primarily the labourers travel, are permanently neglected. “PIA needs to focus on route and menu planning,” Nilofar said.

The committee also recommended that all foreign airlines operating in Pakistan should run Pakistan’s tourism documentaries and observed that some foreign airlines also provided sub-standard services on Pakistani routes.

Besides Nilofar and Rashid, the meeting was attended by senators Muhammad Kazim Khan, Salahuddin Dogar and Abdul Khaliq Pirzada.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 23^rd, 2011.