Zest Air - suspended by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines

Budget Philippine carrier Zest Air has been suspended by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines for safety breaches. It has been reported that aircraft were being refueled with passengers on board, excessive flight time for flight crew and numerous other documented occurrences.

Earlier this year I was to fly to Tagbilaran from Manila and was met with huge lines, disorganisation and incompetence in the Zest Air terminal. The check in arrangements at the terminal are pure pandemonium.

I was told to line up incorrectly, the flight was overbooked to such an extent that there was no way most of the passengers had any hope of boarding.

I was watching the time; boarding time was approaching, I just assumed the flight would be held due to the amount of people who hadn't checked in - I was wrong. The lines were just not moving.

The staff just pulled the sign down and word quickly got around that the flight had already departed - I was amazed. All hell broke loose, I made sure I was at the front of the line demanding my flight with many others. 

After about three hours, these fools were able to get me booked on a flight to another destination, then told me I could take a ferry to my desired destination.

An airline giving me directions for a ferry - who would have guessed that!!! My next flight was delayed by a couple of hours, missed the ferry and spent the night in the wrong place.

To make the ferry, I was up at 4:30 to wait in line at the ferry terminal as many of my new friends I made in the terminal were there lining up early too. The ferry had a damaged engine but set sail anyway, a slow trip but finally arrived late afternoon after lining up for a morning flight a day earlier.

This was May this year and I had forgotten all about it; this is after all a usual travel story in a developing country. Tonight when I saw the news headlines, I remembered why I vowed never to fly this airline again - it appears it was a good decision.

It was a life experience and time to move on, well, it didn't take long for the aviation authority to shut them down after Air Asia after purchased a 49% stake in March this year.

To find out these practices had been taking place was no surprise, the check in counter is where most people interact with the airline. Behind the scenes are maintenance crews, baggage handlers, aircraft handlers but not a qualified accountable manager, who would have guessed. 

When the management parachute out of an airline, this is a cause for concern, especially when they don't want to take responsibility for shoddy work practices. I won't fly them again and I am glad unsuspecting passengers are not put at risk either.