This story is part of AIN's continuing coverage of the impact of the coronavirus on aviation.
Noting many smaller operators are still awaiting financial assistance under the renewed Payroll Support Program (PSP), five aviation organizations representing smaller scheduled and nonscheduled commercial fixed-wing and helicopter operators appealed to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to see that the remaining applications for workforce compensation assistance be processed with the same urgency as the larger carriers.
In a letter to Yellen, the organizations—the National Air Carrier Association, National Air Transportation Association, NBAA, Helicopter Association International, and Regional Airline Association—asked for an update on plans to provide financial assistance on the PSP program and noted that larger carriers have already begun to receive their funding.
Congress in December set aside $15 billion to provide passenger air carrier payroll support, renewing a program that was first established in April of last year under the Cares Act.
Noting that the original PSP expired on Oct. 1, 2020, the organizations stressed, “With every day that passes without certainty on the status of the financial assistance, businesses are seeing their situations worsen to the detriment of their workforce.”
The PSP extension, included in Consolidated Appropriations Act, gave the Treasury Department 10 days following the December 27 enactment of the bill to make initial payments. Meanwhile, applications were due on January 14. Before the deadline, the Treasury Department was already in contact with 12 large carriers to ensure their applications were processed expeditiously, the groups said, adding $6.1 billion was quickly disseminated.
“While we are appreciative and grateful for the department’s quick processing of these applications to support the workforces of these carriers, we are frustrated that the approximately 300 carriers and operators who have also applied to the program have not received their PSP support,” they said. “In fact, many of our members have not had direct communication from the department about their applications.”
They added their segments have been among the hardest hit by the pandemic, pointing out that four regional airlines have ceased operating in whole or part resulting in thousands of job losses.
General aviation carriers, meanwhile, do not have access to the expansive lending of large carriers. And a number of small carriers received underfunded payroll support awards under the Cares Act PSP because of paperwork requirements and inequitable criteria applied to the calculations, they maintained, noting the recent PSP extension was intended to remedy this.
