Unpaid Air Namibia bills ground aircraft

UNPAID Shell fuel accounts kept two Air Namibia aircraft were delayed for almost two hours at Cape Town International Airport on Wednesday.
A Shell employee confirmed yesterday that Shell refused to refuel a Boeing 737 and a Beechcraft 1900 on Tuesday because of outstanding fuel payments from Air Namibia.

Ben Dawa, Air Namibia’s General Manager of Technical Operations admitted that a ‘misunderstanding’ between Shell and Air Namibia had led to the delay of two Air Namibia flights to Windhoek. He said the incident ‘was a misunderstanding between Shell and ourselves. In fact, that should not have happened.’He added that Shell recently concluded a balance check on Air Namibia’s accounts, and they ‘picked up some outstanding invoices that Air Namibia was not aware of’.Dawa added that the outstanding balance ‘was outside the risk margin which Shell has in place on their contract with Air Namibia’. Shell ‘felt uncomfortable and they demanded payment immediately,’ Dawa said. He added that Air Namibia was only notified about the outstanding fees and suspension of services from Shell on Monday this week.Shell sent e-mail to Air Namibia on Monday night asking for immediate payment of the outstanding accounts, and warned that they ‘would stop supplying fuel at midnight,’ Dawa said. According to Dawa, ‘the first two flights were impacted before the issue could be resolved’ on Wednesday.Delayed for one and a half hours, the flights eventually took off from Cape Town after the airline and fuel company officials had resolved the issue.Shell officials refused to comment on the matter, and said they were unable to comment on ‘individual accounts’.