The opening of the Singapore-China green lane and the restarting of transit flights helped to boost passenger movements at Changi Airport last month, but only barely. The number - 48,200 - is still 99.2% below what it was in the same period last year, data released by Changi Airport Group (CAG) showed Monday. The Singapore Airlines (SIA) Group has reported a similar plunge in passenger numbers, with the 17,700 passengers it carried last month a 99.5% drop from last year. CAG told The Straits Times that it has handled more than 10,000 transit passenger movements since the gradual reopening to transit flights on June 2, "though these still remain at very low levels compared to pre-Covid-19". Currently, only flights by the SIA Group - comprising SIA, SilkAir and Scoot - from selected cities are allowed to transit at Changi. CAG said it is handling about 300 scheduled passenger flights per week this month, compared with around 170 per week in April, the first month after the ban on short-term visitors to Singapore kicked in. SIA said that the pandemic continues to have a severe impact on international air travel. "Progress towards a global lifting of border controls and travel restrictions, which could facilitate or result in the easier movement of travellers between countries, is slower than earlier expected," said SIA.<br/>
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The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on Monday filed a lawsuit accusing United Airlines Inc of religious discrimination for requiring a Buddhist pilot with alcoholism to attend Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meetings despite his objection to their religious nature. The commission in a complaint filed in New Jersey federal court said United refused to allow the pilot, David Disbrow, to instead attend meetings of Buddhist support group Refuge Recovery in order to earn back a medical certificate he needed to fly.<br/>
Air NZ customers whose flights were cancelled due to Covid-19 have redeemed $1.36m worth of credit in less than 24 hours using the airline’s new online credit tool. Air NZ’s online credit redemption tool went live at 10am on Monday, for the more than 300,000 customers who held credit for coronavirus-related disruptions. The tool allows customers who bought a ticket in New Zealand dollars from Air NZ to view their credit and use it to book new flights, instead of having to call the airline’s contact centre. Air NZ chief commercial and customer officer Cam Wallace said the airline acknowledged it had not acted quickly in resolving issues around credit and thanked customers for their patience. The issuing of credit instead of refunding tickets cancelled as a result of Covid-19 disruption to air travel has angered many customers, but Air New Zealand was not legally required to refund passengers for many non-refundable tickets. Air NZ chief digital officer Jennifer Sepull said the tool had been months in the making. “We wanted to create a solution that was intuitive and able to manage the large number of customers needing to redeem credit,” Sepull said. Over the next few months the credit tool would evolve to increase its self-service capability, she said.<br/>