Airline to manage teachers’ air travel

AIR Niugini has signed an agreement with the Education department to manage air travels for its officials including teachers.
All flights by department employees will be managed by the airline under its Universal Air Travel Plan programme.
Secretary Dr Uke Kombra, pictured, told The National that the department spent an estimated K3 million annually on air travel.
The agreement will cover official trips but could be extended later to also cover trips taken by the 800 department staff and about 56,000 teachers nationwide. “Official travel means when we from the department travel across the country for different activities and programmes,” he said.
“It (includes) teachers who we bring in for things such as writing exams. We discussed the possibility of including teachers and public servants’ leave fares.
“At the moment, we have an arrangement where the person chooses which travel agent to use.
“We want to give them that flexibility and freedom of choice. Also it is a new programme and we want to test it out first.  If we find value in it, then we will extend it to the next levels and the numbers will be even bigger.”
The airline has 3100 customers covered under the plan including companies and individuals. Air Niugini general manger commercial Dominic Kaumu said the airline wanted to make travelling easier .