"Only 3 Passengers on a 180-Seat Flight"... The Shocking State of the 'Honeymoon Hotspot'

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Request to Ease Seat Supply Requirement Rejected

Fair Trade Commission: "Does Not Meet Criteria for Change in Corrective Measures"

The Fair Trade Commission has effectively decided not to accept the request from five airlines, including Korean Air, to relax the seat supply maintenance obligations for the Guam route, where passenger demand has declined. The reason is that the situation did not arise after the corrective measure requiring seat supply maintenance was imposed by the Commission.

Overview of Guam PIC Resort. Hanatour

On September 30, the Fair Trade Commission announced that it had sent its review report on the application to change the corrective measures for the Incheon-Guam and Busan-Guam routes to Korean Air and other concerned parties, and initiated the deliberation process.

Previously, in approving the merger between Korean Air and Asiana Airlines, the Commission had imposed a condition last year that the number of seats per year and per route must be maintained at no less than 90% of the 2019 pre-pandemic level.

However, recently, a sharp drop in demand for travel to Guam has created problems. Guam, which was once a popular honeymoon destination, has seen a significant reduction in demand due to declining tourism infrastructure and rising exchange rates. With so few passengers, the airline industry has begun calling the Guam route “Nubconomy”(economy class seats where you can lie down as all the adjacent seats are empty). In fact, in November of last year, there was a situation where only three passengers and six airline employees were aboard a 180-seat flight from Busan to Guam.

In this situation, five airlines—Korean Air, Jin Air, Asiana Airlines, Air Busan, and Air Seoul—requested that the seat supply maintenance requirement be lowered from 90% to 70% of the 2019 level. However, the Fair Trade Commission did not accept this request, stating that there had not been a significant change in circumstances sufficient to warrant amending the corrective measure.

Seongbok Jeon, Director of the Mergers and Acquisitions Review Division at the Fair Trade Commission, explained, "For the corrective measures to be amended, a new circumstance such as a natural disaster or an external event causing a drastic change in demand must have occurred after December 24, 2024, when the Commission finalized the corrective measures." He added, "The decrease in Guam tourism demand and other conditions presented by Korean Air cannot be regarded as new developments that occurred after the corrective measure was finalized."

Accordingly, the Commission's examiner has submitted to the Commission a review report recommending that the applications to amend the corrective measures for the Incheon-Guam and Busan-Guam routes be dismissed. The Fair Trade Commission will subsequently determine, through deliberation at a plenary session, whether to impose sanctions and to what extent, as well as whether to adjust the seat supply maintenance requirement downward.

Meanwhile, regarding the fact that Korean Air, Asiana Airlines, and others supplied fewer than 90% of the 2019 seat capacity for the Cheongju-Jeju route from December 2024 to the end of last year, the review report included the opinion that the imposition of a compulsory enforcement fine and criminal charges against the corporations is necessary.

Director Jeon stated, "We would like to see Korean Air comply with the corrective measures more responsibly. We also hope that there will be no further violations of the corrective measures and that the obligations will be fully observed throughout the implementation period."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.