(Eagle News)–The Philippine Airlines gave the assurance on Saturday, Sept. 19, that it was committed to fulfilling all its “refund obligations,” as it apologized to its passengers for the long processing time for the same.
In a statement, PAL noted that it was “doing all we can to cope with the massive deluge of refund requests” that it received after the global pandemic forced it to cancel more than 60,000 PAL flights since March 2020, affecting over 1.3 million passengers.
“The loss of revenues deprived us of liquidity to make prompt refund payments, even as lockdown restrictions posed serious staffing and logistical limitations,” it added.
Nonetheless, PAL said it has “progressively stepped up our processing capabilities to address the system backlogs.”
So far, it said it has refunded about 80% of the more than $300-million (P15.9 billion) COVID-related refund requests.
“We recognize that this has taken some time, and we greatly appreciate your understanding as we continue to resolve these challenges over the coming months,”, PAL said, noting that it has now restored nearly 15% of its regular domestic and global network, and intends to ramp up its flights and routes with an expected easing of travel and quarantine restrictions.
Earlier, Cebu Pacific also apologized for the delay in the processing of refund requests, but assured passengers all valid requests would be processed.
