Lufthansa shuts Chennai office, sacks 8

FLIGHTS TO STAY
Lufthansa shuts Chennai office, sacks 8
V Ayyappan TNN

Feb 7
Chennai: Close on the heels of cutting down services, foreign carriers are trimming their manpower in the country. Lufthansa on Friday shut its sales and passenger service office in Chennai and issued pink slips to eight people. The airline also closed its offices in Hyderabad, Bangalore and Kolkata and gave pink slips to nearly 30 people. However, Lufthansa has decided to keep its offices in Mumbai and Delhi open. In Chennai, the sacked employees were a manager of Passenger Sales and seven members of support staff at its Anna Salai office. The office will be closed and the general manager who heads the airline’s Chennai office will work from his house. Lufthansa has already outsourced its passenger service operation at the airport to Globe Ground. The airline has just two people at the Chennai airport – a manager and a supervisor – all other staff belongs to Globe Ground. The move came as a surprise to the employees because the airline posted a profit last quarter and it is also one of the most preferred airlines to fly to Europe and the US from Chennai. “It came quick. We had no inkling of what was in store,” said a fired employee. He said “the airline had just fewer than 30 people spread over its offices at Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi. The company fired employees because they have decided to outsource customer relations services.” Lufthansa officials refused to comment on the layoffs. Airport sources said Lufthansa will not cut services from Chennai though Air France would be pulling out from March. Singapore Airlines and Malaysian Airlines have already cut their day services. Garuda Air has already postponed plans to start operations from Chennai. Air Passengers Association of India (APAI) president D Sudhakara Reddy said the move would lead to more customer dissatisfaction. “It will also widen the gap between the customer and the service provider. Outsourcing is the norm abroad, but call centres here are not equipped to handle international passengers...Call centre executives may not have a complete grasp of such details. Every time we call them a different person will pick up and we will have to repeat the query all over. Such things will not help a passenger clarify his doubts.”