Capital A in bid to appeal to apex court over summary judgment on passenger service fees

Capital A Bhd, formerly known as AirAsia Group Bhd, has filed applications to seek leave to pursue its appeal to the Federal Court to set aside a High Court’s decision to grant a summary judgment to Malaysia Airports (Sepang) Sdn Bhd (MASSB) on the payment of outstanding passenger service charges (PSC).

In a Bursa filing on Monday, Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad (MAHB) said AirAsia Bhd and AirAsia X Bhd had filed the notices of motion for leave to appeal on April 1.

It said the Court of Appeal had upheld the order of the Kuala Lumpur High Court which granted the summary judgment in favour of MASSB, a wholly-owned subsidiary of MAHB, for passenger service charges and late payment charges in three suits filed by MASSB against AirAsia and AirAsia X.

“The Court of Appeal had further upheld the order of the Kuala Lumpur High Court dated July 18, 2019 to dismiss AirAsia’s applications to strike out MASSB’s three civil suits,” MAHB said.

On March 3, this year, the Court of Appeal upheld the Kuala Lumpur High Court’s decision ordering AirAsia and AirAsia X to pay RM40.73 million in PSC and RM792,381 in unpaid late payment charges to MASSB.

The court also dismissed three appeals by AirAsia against the High Court’s refusal to allow the low-cost carrier’s application to strike out the lawsuit filed against it by MASSB.

MASSB’s claims against AirAsia and AAX are for unpaid PSC at the rate set by the Malaysian Aviation Commission (Mavcom) under the Mavcom (Aviation Service Charges) Regulations 2016 which were amended in 2017 and 2018.