The Emirates Group will award eligible employees a five-month (20-week) salary as a bonus after the company announced a significant profit of AED 18.7 billion ($5.1 billion).

This marks an impressive 71 per cent surge from the previous year’s AED 10.9 billion ($3.0 billion). The group’s workforce rose by 10 per cent to 112,406 – its largest employee workforce to date as Emirates and Dnata saw significant profit and revenue increases in 2023.

The company also recently announced it will be sprucing up offers for its global pilot recruitment programme with improved benefits, higher salaries and better perks.

In an email seen by UAE media outlet Khaleej Times, Emirates Airline and Group Chief Executive Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum expressed gratitude to the group’s employees for their “heroic efforts”.

Al Maktoum commended their dedication “for powering our collective ambitions and for achieving them,” adding that employees deserve “every dirham of the 20-week profit share”.

In April 2024, Emirates was called out by A Fly Guy’s Cabin Crew Lounge, a Facebook group consisting of over a million aviation professionals for “forcing” crew to report for flights during the extreme floods that hit the UAE.

An open letter sent by Emirates President, Sir Tim Clark, to customers regarding the disruption also received unfavourable feedback because the statement failed to mention the efforts of crew members during the record storms.

In 2023, Emirates employees also received a 24-week bonus when the group posted a Dh10.6 billion ($2.9 billion) profit in the fiscal year that ended on March 31, 2024.