Malaysia Aviation Group (MAG) Group Managing Director Izham Ismail has confirmed the entity filed an injunction late last year in a bid to stop AirAsia (AK, Kuala Lumpur International) from selling Malaysia Airlines (MH, Kuala Lumpur International) tickets via its Super App. MAG is the parent entity of Malaysia Airlines, Firefly (FY, Penang), and MASwings (MY, Kota Kinabalu).
Ismail this week confirmed the legal move after a Malaysian government minister told media that MAG had moved to stop AirAsia from selling Malaysia Airlines tickets via their app. A hearing is scheduled in August 2023. According to Ismail, MAG and AirAsia had failed to come to terms regarding ticket sales on the app, but AirAsia continued to sell tickets, acquiring seat inventory aggregators and consolidators, including kiwi.com, which is not a Malaysia Airlines partner.
"They (AirAsia Super App) never had a commercial agreement with us but they have been selling our tickets for the last two and a half years," said Ismail. "All airlines want to work with online travel agencies (OTAs), aggregators and travel agents, but you must have a commercial agreement first because OTAs will make a markup, and after-sale services are key issues that need to be resolved before committing. These issues have yet to be resolved." In addition to operating several airline brands, AirAsia is also a recognised OTA. Typically, MAG sells around 12% of its seats via OTAs.
Ismail says the lack of regulation around unauthorised OTAs selling Malaysia Airlines tickets is problematic, as well as inflated prices and the OTAs not passing on passenger details, which means the airline cannot contact passengers in the event of cancellations or other operational problems.
