Recently, Xi’an’s local aviation company, Happy Airlines Co., Ltd., has been exposed for long-term delays in paying salaries and social security, sparking social concern. Pilots of the airline revealed that the company has been delaying payments for three years, and many pilots, flight attendants, and ground staff have resorted to delivering food, driving for ride-hailing services, and setting up street stalls to make ends meet. One pilot has been delivering food to make a living for a year and a half.
According to Qilu Evening News, on November 30th, in an interview with a flight pilot from Happy Airlines named Li Wei (pseudonym), he talked about the wage arrears issue at the company and stated that due to the arrears, many pilots, flight attendants, and ground staff have started taking up delivering food, driving for ride-hailing services, and setting up street stalls to supplement their income.
“In the civil aviation industry, a pilot’s salary consists of a base salary plus hourly fees, with the majority coming from the latter. The base salary is only a few thousand yuan, so if the hourly fees are delayed, the salary will be significantly reduced,” Li Wei said.
Li Wei indicated that wage arrears at Happy Airlines started three years ago, and until now, many colleagues are struggling to maintain the most basic living standards.
“As for my personal wage arrears, the base salary is around fifty to sixty thousand yuan, and contributions to housing provident fund and social security have not been paid for a long time, along with the retained salary promised by the company, totaling around one hundred thousand yuan,” Li Wei added.
Li Wei disclosed that the group of employees affected by wage arrears includes aircrew, flight attendants, ground staff, administrative staff, and many others.
Furthermore, Li Wei revealed that in recent days, Happy Airlines has only had three aircraft operating daily, which is far from ideal. Additionally, many pilots have not flown for an extended period. Records provided by Li Wei show that his last flight was in a Xinzhou 60 aircraft in 2021. Due to the lack of flight opportunities, Li Wei’s aircraft type qualification has expired.
In addition, Li Wei mentioned that despite the wage arrears, the company had distributed some holiday gifts, which he and his colleagues found strange. “Spending money on gifts while failing to pay salaries is not what we need. We urgently need to address our daily life issues.”
Affected by this situation, Li Wei and his colleagues have previously reported the matter to units such as Xi’an Aerospace Investment Co., Ltd., Xi’an State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, and the Civil Aviation Administration of Northwest China. At the time, they received some promises, but nothing materialized.
“Due to the long duration of wage arrears, some colleagues have taken up jobs as food delivery drivers, online ride-hailing drivers, or street vendors, trying almost every means of making a living,” Li Wei said. He has been delivering food for a year and a half, finding it to be not as lucrative but at least offering flexible hours and consistent income to cover some household expenses. Li Wei also provided records of his food delivery orders.
On November 5th this year, the Xi’an State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission announced that Happy Airlines needs to expedite the clarification of total debts and debt categories.
In 2023, Li Hongliang, who had previously served as the Party Committee Secretary and Disciplinary Committee Secretary of Happy Airlines, filed a lawsuit against the company for failing to pay his performance bonuses of 48,000 yuan for 2019 and 60,000 yuan for the first quarter of 2020, amounting to a total of 108,000 yuan. After the first-instance judgment of the case, both parties appealed, but the appeal was rejected by the Xi’an Intermediate Court, upholding the initial judgment and requiring Happy Airlines to pay Li Hongliang 60,000 yuan for performance bonuses from January to March 2020 within ten days of the judgment becoming effective.
Moreover, public information shows that the legal representative of Happy Airlines, Peng Shibing, has been subject to a travel ban, preventing him from even flying in the first-class cabin of their own airline.
On the morning of November 27th, a person in charge from the Party and Mass Work Department of Happy Airlines stated that they were not available for media interviews regarding the wage arrears issue. Relevant departments, including civil aviation units, are currently studying solutions to address the situation.
According to a report by Red Star News on November 16, an employee of Happy Airlines named Wang stated that since 2020, the company has been sporadically paying salaries, sometimes with a gap of one month or even two months, and since 2021, they have started withholding hourly fees intermittently.
Wang mentioned that in October, the company did not pay her salary, only providing a basic salary of 1000 yuan in September.
Furthermore, in the civil aviation industry, flight attendants or pilots’ hourly fees are based on grades and constitute a significant portion of their daily wages. Therefore, the base salary is relatively low, and if the hourly fees are overdue, it means a significant reduction in employees’ income.
Wang revealed that some employees of the company have experienced disruptions in their social security contributions. “We are unsure about jumping to other companies because our social security hasn’t been fully paid. If we move to another company, we would have to make up for these contributions ourselves.”
Another employee of the company, Mr. Liu, stated that the company has currently owed him nearly ten months’ worth of basic salary, over a year of social security payments, more than two years of housing provident fund contributions, and pension insurance payments have not been made. “Besides these, there are heating fees, high-temperature fees, and we don’t even know how much is owed anymore.”
Mr. Liu provided text messages indicating partial wage and hourly fee payments, showing that sometimes his hourly fee was only slightly over 100 yuan, and his pension insurance records showed zero payment months for several years.
Mr. Liu admitted that after being owed wages, his attempts to communicate with the company only resulted in the response that the company had no money.