Dimitris Kouimtsidis
THE COVID-19 crisis has hit every part of society hard with the darkest cloud hanging over the airline industry.
Many carriers are struggling financially and some, like Flybe, have collapsed completely.
Then Jet2 announced the cancellation of all flights and holidays until mid June.
But after the Olive Press spoke with two of the leisure airline’s UK-based staff there’s reason to believe in silver linings.
Due to company policy, both workers have chosen to stay anonymous and all we can reveal is that one is male and the other female.
“Just like most of Europe, we didn’t really think coronavirus would be such a big thing, it sort of crept up on us,” said the man.
“It all started getting real when Flybe went under and borders started shutting.”
But while others were worried about their jobs and income, both workers felt more confident.
“Our management was always reassuring us saying that no matter what, we’d get paid.
“Our CEO explained how the company felt responsible to take care of all 14,000 employees and we believed in them,” said the man.
His colleague agreed: “I will never complain about having to wake up for a 3am shift again, I’m grateful for where I am.”
“Virgin put their employees on eight weeks unpaid leave and EasyJet on 12 weeks, before the government stepped in to help financially,” she said.
“Jet2 had assured us they would look after us and they came through.”
Both feel quietly optimistic that the airline will be back up and running in some respect by June 17, which is the date they set out on Tuesday.
“We will probably have to go back a week or two early to do some refresher courses in order to make sure we’re up to scratch,” said the man.
The UK Government has been panned around the country for not acting fast enough, but the male employee believes that they handled the situation as best they could.
“You can’t just shut down the country overnight, the economy would crumble and companies would shut down.
“I do really hope we go back to work in June though, because if the situation goes on longer than that, I’m worried about the fate of the airline industry worldwide.”
