Efforts to Prioritize Hiring of Resignees and Dismissed Employees
Prolonged Negotiations on Some Return Timings
Cumulative Workload Burden Over 2 Years
Future Discussions Planned for New Recruitment
"When we request reemployment, most of the time we hear the response, ‘Sorry, but I have already found a job.’ Since it has been two years since flight operations were suspended, we fully understand, but from our perspective, where immediate manpower replenishment is urgent, it is a difficult situation.” As Eastar Jet accelerates efforts to normalize operations, it is facing difficulties in securing personnel. The company is requesting reemployment in the order of reinstating idle employees first as originally planned, followed by voluntary retirees and laid-off workers, but actual cases leading to work resumption appear to be few.
According to the aviation industry on the 21st, Eastar Jet recently launched an internal recruitment drive to bolster general office staff. The recruitment areas include essential management personnel such as finance, general affairs, and planning, but among the remaining employees, applicants are extremely rare. Currently, Eastar Jet has about 480 employees in total, of whom around 100 are working, and about 380 are preparing to return to work in accordance with the Air Operator Certificate (AOC) approval. However, most of the idle personnel are field workers such as flight attendants, pilots, and maintenance technicians, and they are reportedly reluctant to switch to office work.
As internal manpower replenishment becomes difficult, Eastar Jet is requesting reemployment mainly from voluntary retirees, general retirees, and dismissed workers from 2020. However, many have already found new jobs or negotiations over the timing of reemployment have been prolonged, making even this difficult. An industry insider said, "It takes considerable time and effort to recover from the work processing over the past two years when operations were suspended," adding, "We understand that those who feel the burden of work in such circumstances are reluctant to be reemployed."
Of course, Eastar Jet can conduct new hiring targeting external personnel. However, in this case, since the final corporate rehabilitation procedure has not been completed, court approval must be obtained. Given the large-scale restructuring concentrated in the aviation industry at the time of layoffs, the company’s policy is to focus as much as possible on the reemployment of these individuals. The deteriorated working conditions, such as the decline in average wages in the aviation industry due to the prolonged impact of COVID-19, are also cited as causes exacerbating the manpower shortage. In particular, in the case of Eastar Jet, even if operations resume with management normalization, it is analyzed that it may take considerable time to improve the profit structure.
An Eastar Jet official said, “We will do our best to fulfill the promise of prioritizing the hiring of retirees when the company normalizes management,” adding, “We are proceeding with essential personnel training such as AOC as scheduled to ensure there is no disruption to the resumption of flights in the first half of this year.”
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