AirAsia owes Malaysian airport operator millions of dollars in unpaid fees, court rules

The low-cost carrier had been locked in a long-running legal dispute over its refusal to raise fees for international passengers leaving its hub in Kuala Lumpur

Airline CEO Tony Fernandes has repeatedly taken to Twitter to criticise the airport’s dirty toilets, uneven runway surfaces – and surfeit of bees

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AirAsia planes at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia. Photo: Reuters

Published: 9:56pm, 18 Jul 2019Updated: 1:56am, 19 Jul 2019

Malaysia’s low-cost carrier AirAsia has lost a long-running and bitter legal feud with state-linked Malaysia Airports (MAHB) after a local court sided with the airport operator in a dispute over increased charges for passengers departing on international flights.

Both sides opted to take the legal route after failing to amicably settle their differences over a steep increase in July 2018 to the passenger service charge (PSC) for international flights departing Kuala Lumpur International Airport 2 (KLIA 2), which serves budget carriers, is managed by a subsidiary of MAHB and functions as the de facto hub for AirAsia.

The popular budget carrier, Southeast Asia’s largest, had refused to comply with the increase of the PSC from 50 (US$12.15) to 73 ringgit, claiming it could not stomach passing on the increase to its customers given KLIA 2’s severely poor standards – including dirty toilets and uneven runway surfaces.

It launched countersuits after MAHB took to the courts to recover PSC funds owed to it, but on Thursday the High Court threw these out and ruled in favour of the airline operator.

Malaysia’s The Edge news portal said in a report that MAHB is owed at least 40.6 million ringgit (US$9.87 million) in unpaid PSC.

AirAsia’s lawyers have said they are appealing the decision.