Air NZ CEO slams IT company in leaked email

Photo / Brett Phibbs

Air New Zealand chief executive Rob Fyfe described IBM's service during a crippling computer fault yesterday as "unacceptable" and "amateur", and Air NZ may look for another IT supplier, according to an internal email.

An IT outage crashed airport check-in systems, as well as on-line bookings and call centre systems about 9.30am yesterday, affecting more than 10,000 passengers and throwing airports into chaos.

The airline said most systems were restored around 1.30pm, but the passenger backlog did not start to clear until self check-in kiosks were up and running again about 3.30pm.

Air NZ and IBM were to meet today to discuss the fault.

Meanwhile, the contents of Mr Fyfe's email were made public by Computerworld.

He said he struggled "to recall a time where I have seen a supplier so slow to react to a catastrophic system failure such as this and so unwilling to accept responsibility and apologise to its client and its client's customers" during his working career.

"We were left high and dry and this is simply unacceptable.

"My expectations of IBM were far higher than the amateur results that were delivered yesterday, and I have been left with no option but to ask the IT team to review the full range of options available to us to ensure we have an IT supplier whom we have confidence in and one who understands and is fully committed to our business and the needs of our customers."

Air NZ's short haul airlines group general manager, Bruce Parton, told Radio New Zealand the fault appeared to have been caused by a power failure, followed by a delay in a back-up generator running.

"Ten thousand-plus customers affected on the last day of holidays, and millions of dollars of revenue not going through our online site, you can be assured we'll be having some very serious discussions with IBM today."

But most passengers delayed by the outage were unlikely to get compensation.

"We'll go through that today. Most people moved within an hour and so it doesn't hit the threshold (for compensation)," Mr Parton said.

Air NZ outsourced its mainframe to IBM in 1997. Four years later, it also outsourced its mid-range systems to IBM.

IBM said it would consider responding to media inquiries over the issue today.

- NZPA