Himalaya Airlines, a Nepali international air carrier has been showing inconvenience to pay pending service charges to Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA).
The airport officials sent letter to Himalaya Airlines, a joint venture of Nepal and China, which has been operating flight services on attractive destinations and earning plenty profits after the carrier overlooked to clear the pending dues.
According to the source, the airport officials have sent a letter asking to clear all dues within a month and warned the airlines to cut off its flight operation if it fails to clear the dues. The carrier which started its international flights with its three aircraft has also been accused of earning extreme profit lately.
Previously, the carrier asked 10 days for clearing of pending dues of Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA). The carrier paid NRs. 5 Million to TIA on January 12 and requested to give 10 days’ more to clear remaining airport service charges of around NRs. 13.5 crore.
The pending dues of Himalaya Airlines has increased more than Rs 14 crore as the carrier failed to clear all dues from a long time.
UAE airlines including Air Arabia, Fly Dubai and Etihad Airways stopped flight services to Doha showing political reasons paved a profitable path for Himalaya Airlines after conducting 2 flights daily.
The source also stated that Himalaya Airlines has stopped the flight services to Colombia of Sri Lanka and Yangon of Myanmar within a short period of time following accusation of weak in passenger services.
Currently, the carrier operates flight to Kuala Lumpur. Doha, Dammam, Dubai.
According to the Airport Service Charge Regulation 2067, the responsibility of collecting airport service charge goes to the chief of the airport who has to submit statement to head office every month. Likewise, those who fail to dispatch airport service charge within 60 days from the generation of bill then the airport chief can halt their business whereas in case of airline operators, the flight will be restricted.
In addition, the authority can blacklist the business and airline operators if they fail to pay the airport service charge and act beyond the rules, regulations and agreement of the authority. In such case, the business and airline operators will be restricted to run any businesses at the airport.
Previously because of failure of paying pending dues, management committee of Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) had halted all flights of Saurya Airlines from December 6,2018 on wards. TIA halted all of the carriers operation since the airline was unable to pay the dues.
The airline had promised to pay the dues to the airport for a long time and after the airline was unable to pay the due amount, the airport had been decreasing the operation hour of the airline.
