The government saves AirUnion

The Russian government will do everything to prevent the bankruptcy of the airline alliance AirUnion , said Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov. According to him, “the situation at AirUnion is difficult, but not hopeless.” “I believe we will overcome this crisis,” he emphasized. The Ministry of Transport has agreed with the largest airlines - Aeroflot, Transaero and State Transport Company Rossiya - to transport passengers on AirUnion tickets in available seats, the head of the ministry Igor Levitin said yesterday. “First of all, we will talk about passengers with children,” he noted. “Today Rosaviatsiya will have to legally formalize this decision.”

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin instructed Rosrezerv to allocate fuel to AirUnion under the guarantees of the state corporation Rostekhnologii, press secretary of the head of government Dmitry Peskov said yesterday. AirUnion airlines will be allocated 24 thousand tons of fuel from the state reserve on the basis of subsequent compensation. From August 26 to September 14, the alliance will receive 1.2 thousand tons of jet fuel per day. “At the Moscow transport hub - 600 tons per day, at the Krasnoyarsk airport - 400 tons per day and at other airports - 200 tons per day,” the government press service said. “This volume of fuel will cover all needs airlines that are part of AirUnion, and resolve the crisis situation associated with the movement of passengers during the peak period of the end of holidays in the country." Meanwhile, yesterday AirUnion was unable to send 22 flights from Moscow; 3.4 thousand passengers were awaiting departure. On Monday evening, airlines did not operate flights to Krasnoyarsk, Samara, St. Petersburg and Nizhnevartovsk. The flight to Samara was postponed to August 27, the rest - to Tuesday evening. Flights to Dushanbe, Dalaman, Baikonur, Sochi, Samara, Tivat and Simferopol, scheduled for the night and morning of Tuesday, were also postponed one day - to August 27. Flights to Antalya, Samara, Vladivostok and Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, which were supposed to take place on Tuesday afternoon, were postponed to Wednesday. On Monday, AirUnion ran out of fuel provided last week by suppliers at Domodedovo airport under guarantees from Russian Technologies.

Since yesterday, the Transport Clearing House has stopped returning money to airline passengers for tickets sold, regardless of whether they voluntarily or were forced to cancel the flight, said AirUnion representative in Tomsk Roman Florenko. “I have no information why this was done,” noted Mr. Florenko, “but it is impossible to return the air tickets now.” According to him, AirUnion has no other way to return money for tickets, and the only remaining option to get money back for a ticket is to send a fax with a corresponding application addressed to the commercial director of AirUnion. AirUnion is currently in discussions with clearing system management about resuming its normal chargeback scheme. According to the law, in case of forced cancellation of a flight, the passenger must be refunded the full cost of his ticket, and in some cases also additional compensation.

Due to a sharp increase in fuel prices, Krasair and other airlines included in AirUnion were unable to repay the debt for jet fuel, which exceeded $1 billion. Due to the refusal of suppliers to refuel AirUnion aircraft, massive flight delays began last week. In addition, the leasing company Ilyushin Finance, to which Krasair owed $20 million for the lease of two passenger aircraft, initiated bankruptcy proceedings for the airline. Rosaviatsia banned AirUnion from selling tickets for the winter season. The AirUnion alliance unites five Russian airlines: Krasair, Domodedovo Airlines, Samara, Omskavia and Sibaviatrans.

Based on materials from RIA Novosti and Interfax