Highland Airways collapses
Scottish airliner goes into administration- PwC at the controls
Scottish airliner goes into administration- PwC at the controls
Partners at PwC have been appointed as joint administrators of Highland
Airways.
The Scottish airliner, which employs close to 100 people went into
administration yesterday at the request of the company’s directors, PwC said.
Bruce Cartwright, joint administrator and head of business recovery services
at PwC in Scotland, said Highland Airways had collapsed because it could not
carry on trading while waiting for a new investor.
He also said it was inevitable that there would be a substantial number of
redundancies.
“The directors have now concluded that the option of maintaining operations
while introducing a new investor is no longer feasible,” said Cartwright.
“The company had encountered trading difficulties including the loss of
certain contracts. As a result they were in discussion with a number of parties
over a period of time with a view to developing a new and viable operating
model.”
All flight operations were stopped with immediate effect at the carrier which
operated a fleet of nine aircraft on various contracts including routes from
Inverness and Oban to the Western Isles, and Cardiff to Anglesey.
The company is currently in contact with passengers who had been expecting to
travel in the coming weeks.
The PwC team will be working with contracted customers to ensure an orderly
handover of services to new operators.
“It is inevitable that there will be a substantial number of redundancies but
we will endeavour where feasible to assist the work force in securing employment
with the new service providers,” Cartwright added.
Further reading:
Scotland’s
biggest airline calls in PwC administrators