This is the last day of the year and as 2021 leaves, many wishes that it brings with it all the hurts, difficulties and not-so-good memories. We are one of those wishers.
Our company, having travel and tours as one of its core businesses, has experienced a lot of struggles since COVID-19 arrived: flight cancellations, delays and rebookings, some confused and angry clients blaming us for some reasons, pressure on making miraculous ways to cover our operational costs while doing everything to give the best service to our dear clients, we constantly need to deal with the Italian and Philippine governments' changes, as well as each airlines' and airports' different procedures .. We make it sure that we fully assist our clients, not only to get their plane tickets, but with the 360 degrees assistance: swabtest appointment reservation, one health pass, dashlab registration, red cross registration and online assistance from the airport of departure up to the airport of arrival.
We know that what everyone is going through is extraordinarily difficult and merely because it is extremely not easy, WE NEED TO BE EXTRAORDINARY BIYAHEROES to our clients.
As Kelly Clarkson sang: "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Truly enough, this experience has made BiyaHero team even greater.
By the month of November 2021, Philippine government declared that the quarantine was reduced from 7 to 3 days... it seemed so surreal that things are getting better after a long period of uttermost uncertainty... many were assured and happy so clients started to book their flights looking forward to celebrate Christmas with their loved ones in the Philippines... what a great gift for everyone!
Then, covid omicron variant came.
November 28, 2021, the Philippine government declared that all flights coming from Italy are banned until December 15, 2021... the country is in the red list just like that! At first, we thought, everything will be okay, maybe there were misunderstandings, maybe they made a wrong decision that might change in one time or another because actually, Italy had a better covid-19 situation reports compared to other European countries... but no, the government remain firm... Italy-in-the-red-list-area was real!
We had approximately 120 passengers preparing to fly to the Philippines in those 2 weeks of banning. We started to receive calls, messages, emails incessantly and everyone would ask the same questions and statements: "what to do now?"... "we need to fly to the Philippines, please help us"... "will they open the flights after 15th?"... "can you give us the assurance that flights will open on the 15th?" and the only answer we could give was:"We are really sorry for what is happening but the only thing that we can do is wait. We cannot promise that flights will open on the 15th but rest assured that we will exert all the efforts to find the best solution for you!"
We knew that we are definitely facing a harder challenge this time... Some of us burst into tears because we knew what our clients do feel. More than the worry about the sleepless and late-night/very-early-morning-voluntary-shifting (again), we want all our clients to fly and celebrate Christmas and New Year with their loved ones. So we needed to act. As Nick Fury said: "In times like this, we need to hope for the best yet prepare for the worst."
The only thing a leader can do in times of uncertainty is to follow his/her instinct. The team decided to rebook as many clients possible from the 15th onwards hoping that flights will open on that day, since flight availabilities were really really few, all ticketing consultants had to try its luck even working late at night or very early in the morning. Clients would call everyday to ask if we had good news but unfortunately, the Philippine government hadn't announced anything yet.
13th of December - we were expecting announcement whether travel ban will be lifted or not but nothing was released, we had to advice our clients to make a decision whether to do the swabtest even without having the assurance that flights will open... all of them took the risk and prepared for the "uncertain flights"
14th of December - still no update
15th of December at 4.30 am - Philippine government finally announced that travel ban has been lifted and passengers from Italy could fly following a 7-day quarantine upon arrival in the Philippines! What a relief!
16th of December - passengers who landed in Cebu airport got stranded due to Odette typhoon, the only help we could give was moral support and constant communication with their airlines to make sure clients are being assisted.
Half of our clients were able to fly that day and the other half were assisted to fly later.
This latter experience is more tragic than covid-19 first wave... we got stressed, we felt helpless and felt really down most especially when clients accuse us for being incompetent in doing our work... but it's not their fault. The most important thing that we really learned doing our job is that people's actions are never actually about us, it is about them! When they get mad, they aren't really angry to us but they need to vent out what they feel and they need someone to listen to them.
This is us, WE ARE BIYAHEROES! We do what we do not only as a job but as a vocation.
Now that we are entering a new year, we are one of those wishers like you: we hope that 2021 brings with it all the hurts, difficulties and not-so-good memories of the past but we also pray that 2022 tranforms all these experiences into stepping stones for us to be better for ourselves and for others.
WE WISH YOU AN ABUNDANT AND PEACEFUL 2022 OUR DEAR BIYAHEROES!
Thank you for keeping on travelling this journey with us!
