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Crew scheduling as a major concern

Medium size airlines like PAL operate hundreds of flights a day consisting of both domestic

and international short medium long haul mission, many of which require period of time. From

a simple turnaround in domestic routes that allows cabin crew of two three people to do four

or five turnarounds a day the transpacific flight of PAL involves a crew of some 17 people with

layover at destinations and intermediate points which last for week on ends. Manual scheduling

has become a very complicated process and the complexity had given rise to malpractices that

plague many airlines today among the malpractices are the rigged biddings to get assigned to

choice flights for highly personal considered like the pursuit of trade on such a route the chance

to visit friends and relatives and so forth.

There are at least seven major functional areas in the business cycle of cabin services it start

with the planning function which determines and is followed by pairing of cabin crew in a flight

the rostering the bidding and the awarding in each step in a manual scheduling environmentpersonal preferences biases favoritism often surface that can result in misunderstanding and

mission break down the resulting schedule are3 monitored every single minute of the day

respond to schedule change which happen often cabin crewmembers involve are adviced of

the changes and if replacement are needed the duty or home reserves whose schedules are

also predetermine in planning stage tapped

The ability of planners to revise flight assignment after the awarding gives rise o charges of

favoritism speculations of flight planners being bought are widespread in the system in this

situation the cabin services management required much interpersonal skills to address and

corrects the often explosive situation when the union leadership occasionally comes into the

picture in behalf of members.

in view of the length of layovers in the international flight and the substantial amounts of

money in foreign currency at that involve in the process proper budgeting and logistics

provisioning at least in major online stations have o be set up necessarily these also required

cashiering and accounting to complete the cabin services business cycle the full cycle has

proven and complex area of airline activity several versions of crew management system (cms)

fee covering four full workstations and four limited workstation all located at the cabin services

headquarters.

PAL is now in the process of acquiring the new CMS known in the industry as the Carmen

crew schedule system it is suppose to be a complete system and definitely much since the

system just like any others and for good reason have provided windows of opportunity for

making change

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Table No. 9

CABIN CREW BUSINESS CYCLE

Planning clearing

Cashier/accounting Dispatch

Budget/logistics transportation

Monitoring

Maintenance and engineering

PAL spending more than P1 billion annually for the upkeep of its aircraft to ensure flight safety

until the year 2000 its maintenance & engineering department (M&F) was the larges with 2600

men and women its ranks major maintenance activities were performs at the pal techniciancenter built by the cruz administration in the rate 1970s it occupies 291,472 square meters in

the balabag area of naia consisting of two huge hangars joined together that could

accommodate four wide body aircraft under their common roof with the shops in the hangars

and an engine overhaul and test cell facility nearby the PCT made PAL self-reliant in the

maintenance of all its aircraft

The PAL M&E traditional had four major function the principal ones are maintenance and

engineering maintenance has a substantial line maintenance division that handles the fleet at

the line to make sure are positioned properly serviced and ready for their assigned flights both

domestically and internally

In major regions of operation like mactan in the cast of PAL a southern Philippines M&E was

established they also service a number of foreign airlines for which increment non transport

revenue were generally base maintenance is comprised of several divisions including aircraft

interior engine electronics accessories and part overhaul.