Malaysia Airlines to revamp its services December onwards

In an attempt to improve services to woo back customers, the Malaysia Airlines will start introducing better services to its passengers over the next 18 months. The move came following the fate of two of its planes, MH370 and MH17, last year that tarnished its image to a world audience.

Chief Executive Christoph Mueller announced that upgradation of the planes and other improvements will be introduced from December onwards. These improvements would be made both in flights as well as on ground and include new seats, better catering, inflight entertainment, lounge concepts and other operational improvements such as improved punctuality and better connection time through Kuala Lumpur.

Mueller, who is also known for leading the turnaround of the Irish carrier Aer Lingus, said the brand name would not be changed as it would lead to a huge cost for painting all the aircrafts. "I would not call it a hard re-branding," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted him as saying. "It is really more a brand refresh."

Malaysia Airlines has been experienced a drop in its capacity of flights to Australia following the twin disasters of MH370 and MH17. The total number of weekly flights have dropped to 43 from 73 with no flights at all from Brisbane and reduced number of flights from Melbourne, Sydney, Perth and Adelaide. The flights were added ahead of the MH370 and MH17 disasters. But Mueller said the airlines would consider adding more capacity from Australia and reintroduce flights from Brisbane.

The uniforms of the staff are also expected to change and the quality of products will also be improved. Mueller said that the airlines tried to tap the Kangaroo route by catering to customers between Australia and Europe, but the idea had to be dropped for the future since the route is now dominated by the Middle Eastern carriers.

"I believe that [Kangaroo route] market is gone for people like us or Singapore Airlines or Garuda [Indonesia] or Thai [Airways]," Mueller said. "It is firmly in the hands of Middle East carriers. But also we recognise China, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, India, are growing and that is where we will focus. We are going from a northwest/southeast focus more to a north/south."

In August, the airlines announced a radical restructuring process, which proposed slashing the number of its staff and close down some of its longer routes to nurture the waning company back to its form.

MH370 and MH17 were international passenger flights, both of which suffered a tragic end. Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing on 8th March, 2014 while en route from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Beijing, China. 227 passengers and 12 crew members were presumed dead following failed extensive search for the aircraft. MH17 was allegedly downed by Pro-Russian insurgents near Torrez in Ukraine on 17th July, 2014. 283 passengers and 15 crew members onboard died.

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