An airline consolidator has told The SUN that PEYA Travel managing director Rhea Donna Boyce had tearfully begged him to issue air tickets to some of her clients on Dec. 16, two days before the travel agency's air booking mess unraveled.
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| Rhea Donna Boyce |
“ She was crying when she called me, begging to issue six tickets for flights on Dec 16 and Dec 17 because some passengers could not go back to the Philippines,” said Hui, who claimed to have been a friend of Boyce for about four years as PEYA provided him "very good" business.
“She is my friend, so I issued the tickets,” Hui said, adding they cost a total of $21,000.
The supposed incident happened two days before hundreds of PEYA clients, mostly overseas Filipino workers, were turned away at the check-in counters at Chek Lap Kok Airport. Airline staff told them PEYA did not pay for their tickets.
But months before this, Hui said he already sensed that PEYA was in trouble. He said that a cheque issued to her by Boyce bounced in August, so by the end of that month his company stopped extending credit to PEYA.
But in September, October and November, Hui said he still provided PEYA one-way tickets for overseas Filipino workers priced at less than $1,000 each, saying "the amounts were not so big".
Not being a full member of the International Air Travel Association (IATA), PEYA had to buy air tickets from consolidators or wholesalers like AGC
Hui said Boyce promised to pay the six PAL tickets before 6pm on Dec 15. But when he called her, the PEYA executive was not in her office in World-Wide Plaza, and told him to come on Saturday afternoon, Dec 16.
“On Saturday afternoon, I kept calling her but she didn’t answer,” Hui said.
Despite this, Hui said he was not angry at Boyce.
“We are still friends. I’m not angry because I’ve known her for three to four years. I know she has been doing investments, like launching a credit card, the PEYA Card,” the AGC executive said.
