KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 1): The four Malaysia-based airlines continued to experience significant fluctuations in their on-time performance (OTP) in the last few months of 2024, amid ongoing supply chain disruptions that showed no sign of abating in 2025.

In November 2024, low-cost carrier AirAsia was the only airline that showed an improvement in OTP — which reflects the punctuality of departure times — for the international sector, latest data from the Malaysian Aviation Commission (Mavcom), the country’s economic aviation regulator, showed. It achieved a score of 70.3% in November from the previous month's OTP of 67%.

Malaysia Airlines, which experienced its worst OTP in August due to operational challenges that had cascaded into a series of flight disruptions, saw its OTP improve after it trimmed its capacity by about 18%. The national carrier had attributed a combination of factors, including weather, technical and manpower challenges, supply chain constraints, and the ongoing normalisation of global aviation operations post-Covid-19 pandemic, to these operational difficulties.

Malaysia Airlines only had 54.7% of its international flights departing within 15 minutes of the scheduled departure time in August, but this improved to 72% in September and 82.9% in October. However, it saw a slight dip in performance in November, with an OTP of 78.2%.

Medium-haul, low-cost carrier AirAsia X Bhd (KL:AAX) and Batik Air Malaysia also saw their international OTP drop in November. AAX recorded an OTP of 82.3% in November, down from 84.5% in October. Batik Air's OTP dropped to 59% from 65.8% over the same period.

Mavcom data showed that when it came to domestic flights, Malaysia Airlines and AAX achieved the 85% OTP target. Airlines are required to achieve a minimum of 85% OTP every month. OTP is defined as flights departing within 15 minutes of their scheduled departure time.

After posting a low of 58.2% in August, Malaysia Airlines' OTP recovered to 78.1% in September, further improving to 90.7% in October. In November, it recorded an OTP of 85.2%.

AAX achieved an OTP of 90%, down from 100% in October. However, it is worth noting that AAX operated 10 domestic flights in October and 30 in November.

AAX’s sister short-haul airline AirAsia recorded a domestic OTP of 70% in November, a slight 0.3-percentage-point decrease from 70.3% in October, while Batik Air's OTP fell to 66.8% from 77.2% over the same period.

Mavcom has started providing actual data on departure flights operated by the four carriers at Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 of the Kuala Lumpur International Airport on its website since April 15 last year. The data come from airport operator Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (KL:AIRPORT).

Mavcom is predicting passenger traffic to reach between 95.4 million and 97.6 million in 2024. Passenger traffic for the first 11 months of 2024 reached 88.3 million.