27th February Big Qantas announcement

[Limewood]

Meeting called in Cairns today at 2pm for all Qantas staff, my FA friends are very concerned, been living here for years, don't wish to move or be made redundant.

 

[Creston]

It is a cough day for many, but I really feel for the employees whom have lost their jobs.
More bad & irrational decision making processes still continuing at QF.

Some employees are jumping for joy.

My friends mum received over $200k (plus super) for taking voluntary redundancy from Qantas after working there for 40 odd years.
She is 65 and was going to retire at the end of this year. Nuts!!

 

[markis10]

Interesting when you look at historical profit after tax as published by the ABC

https://twitter.com/ABCNews24/status/438877473275514880/photo/1

Qantas made a higher net profit in the year AJ was appointed than they have made for all the years since he took over combined.

 

[alieninperth]

I can't see how QF are failing to capitalise on the mining and, oil and gas industries here in WA. There are 3 main hubs for Oil and Gas around the world; Aberdeen, Scotland (5 flights a day to LHR and 2 to LCY all on BA, as well as numerous AF,LH and KL flights), Houston, Texas (now a destination for BA and the Dreamliner as well as good connections to DFW on AA) and Perth (serviced by MH and CX internationally and so so doimestically by QF).

There has been a trend over the last few years of major mining companies moving SEA HQs to Perth; Woodside, RIO etc failing to meet the demand of premium traffic between the major centres in SEA, Europe (LON) and the US (HOU or DFW at a push) only shows how limited QFs outlook has been over the last half dozen years, and how Syd centric it has all been. I think I'll keep QFF as its easy enough to maintain status but all of my international travel will be on CX of MH from now on.

 

[AnonymousCoward]

It is so easy to speak with those rose coloured glasses on, isn't it?

QF clearly markets itself as The spirit of Australia. Last time I checked, both Adelaide and Perth were part of Australia. It is funny that other carriers seem to make PER and ADL work, yet QF can't. Perhaps they should change their (misleading) slogan to the Spirit of Anywhere east of Melbourne.

Hub-n-spokes right? SQ can fly to ADL, PER, SYD and whatever because they consolidate traffic in SIN, and then distribute it. QF consolidates in SYD (and to a lessor extent MEL). Are you saying they should make PER and ADL hubs as well?

What seems obvious is that with the cost base that QF has, the populations of ADL and PER (and the surrounding towns) aren't sufficient to support traffic to SG. QF has already tried to have SIN as a hub (consolidating PER, BNE, ADL, MEL, SYD traffic for onwards distribution to Europe to LHR/FRA/CDG), but wasn't able to keep that working either.

If you've got some good ideas, share them. But the above seems to avoid commercial reality.

 

[AnonymousCoward]

Interesting when you look at historical profit after tax as published by the ABC

Qantas made a higher net profit in the year AJ was appointed than they have made for all the years since he took over combined.

How is this "interesting"? Are you claiming some causation between the two events?

 

[comforttravel]

I like this option
I really loved taking QF 29/30.
Now if only they would re-route it through HKG I would be a happy little camper

Arriving back into MEL at about 21:30 is fine if MEL is your final destination. What about those continuing onto ADL, CBR, HBA, BNE and other destinations when they want to fly QF metal.

 

[Mr_Orange]

The only thing seems to be this idea that DXB is a) immoral b) a bad place to transit or c) you hate EK. None of these apply! You don't have to leave the airport.

There are other far more significant reasons why one would not want to transit in DXB or indeed any ME port.

You have a extremely narrow minded view if you believe it is just the emotional response you have listed.

 

[ComeFlyWithMe]

Arriving back into MEL at about 21:30 is fine if MEL is your final destination. What about those continuing onto ADL, CBR, HBA, BNE and other destinations when they want to fly QF metal.

You travel via SYD...

 

[kevrosmith]

Meeting called in Cairns today at 2pm for all Qantas staff, my FA friends are very concerned, been living here for years, don't wish to move or be made redundant.

Ah... can you let me know what you hear from this. I know many of the CNS QF crew.. most (if not all) are ex-AO crew.

CSM on Monday noted that, with the drop of one crew member on every 737 service lately, they are effectively 20% over-staffed at the CNS base.

 

[bertair]

Interesting stats from Markis10.
But where I see the major problem, and has been for some time is the ideology of Australia and so much of the way of "we are the best" attitude that I experience in so many situations. The arrogance is widespread in so many quarters and I do not mean just the airline.
Sure much is pretty good in this country, but more than we will ever know, is that decisions made behind closed doors effects so many and often to our detriment we as a society have so little control over.
A CEO like Joyce carries a big responsibility and as others have said, the "Buck Stops With Him".
The honourable thing to do for him would be to resign and walk away, (without the millions like Dixon did), but I doubt if he will, and unless he gets pushed, things are only going to get worse under his regime.
As for us loyal Qantas flyers, there is very little respect or consideration in decent Customer Relations these days towards us and the shift to other carriers is only going to grow. My next trip in a few weeks time will, for the first time be with a rival airline.
I don't have the answers to Qantas' woes, but I and many other have enough of our gripes about Qantas, that is is probably too late to keep us in the fold.
Nothing short of a Government probe into the company and how it does business will give it a life line, because in the next 5 to 8 years there will be little left that resembles Qantas I fear.

 

[Shan Man]

It's time to go, Alan Joyce.

I think he needs to face off Cornelia

 

[Danger]

It is so easy to speak with those rose coloured glasses on, isn't it?

QF clearly markets itself as The spirit of Australia. Last time I checked, both Adelaide and Perth were part of Australia. It is funny that other carriers seem to make PER and ADL work, yet QF can't. Perhaps they should change their (misleading) slogan to the Spirit of Anywhere east of Melbourne.

Perhaps it is the disdain that QF treated these two Centres with created its demise with the services. A 00:50 and a 4:55 arrival into PER doesn't suit everyone, nor were the services particularly well timed, or made connections easy. It is almost as if they deliberately timed these services to fail.

Here, here.

Hub-n-spokes right? SQ can fly to ADL, PER, SYD and whatever because they consolidate traffic in SIN, and then distribute it. QF consolidates in SYD (and to a lessor extent MEL). Are you saying they should make PER and ADL hubs as well?

What seems obvious is that with the cost base that QF has, the populations of ADL and PER (and the surrounding towns) aren't sufficient to support traffic to SG. QF has already tried to have SIN as a hub (consolidating PER, BNE, ADL, MEL, SYD traffic for onwards distribution to Europe to LHR/FRA/CDG), but wasn't able to keep that working either.

If you've got some good ideas, share them. But the above seems to avoid commercial reality.

I don't think anyone is saying Perth and Adelaide should be hubs but I for one believe they should have international services. Countless times throughout AFF there have been - admittedly armchair - suggestions as to how QF might make PER and ADL better. mannej, just a few minutes ago, highlighted the God-awful arrival times. Others have suggested linking in with CX and now MH connections. Some have suggested having a SIN-Europe service, perhaps to Berlin or maybe even Doha, whereby PER and ADL services could funnel into.

If you continually stack the deck against you, which I and I think many others believe QF has done in Perth at least, then you're bound to lose your hand.

 

[dajop]

InQantas made a higher net profit in the year AJ was appointed than they have made for all the years since he took over combined.

To be fair, what year did DL & VA move in on the cash cow (Transpac), where once you couldn't find fares in premium classes that would give change out of $10K suddenly became more or like $7K and charging $2.5K for economy came more like $1500. Also when did VA start aggressively chasing the corporate market in Australia? I suggest that whilst AJ is not blameless, QF became bloated and fat on the profits of a cosy duopoly across the Pacific and near corporate monopoly domestically, and didn't see or plan for the inevitable writing on the wall, with bad fleet decisions and single minded focus on private equity takeover at the expense of the long term interests of the company. It is much easier to be in JB's position of being the chaser, nothing to lose - everything to gain, than in AJ's position of being chased. Not to say AJ has done a particularly inspiring job, just that the seeds of what we are seeing were sown in Dixon's reign.

 

[jetranger]

Hi all,

Just tired to ring Qantas regarding changing our affected PER-SIN rtn booking and have been advised that they are not able to help at this stage. Seems the arrangements detailed on the Qantas Industry website have not made their way to booking staff or the reservations yet so will have to wait.

Think I might cut the Qantas staff some slack and not bother them over the next couple of days.......I'm sure they have a lot on their mind.

 

[Stanley Lambchop]

The announcement today seems a bit light given QF was supposedly announcing the results of a "strategic" review.

Yes, there is some operational restructuring (headcount reduction - I feel for the 5,000 affected today, capex deferral, some minor route changes) but where is the strategic direction? How does Joyce propose to make the best strategic use of QFF (sale, IPO, joint venture)? What is its domestic capacity / market share strategy - hold the 65% "line in the sand" as a point of principle, no matter what the cost? How does QF reconcile the long-term conflict between the OW alliance and the EK arrangement?

This just looks like the first step in a wider process, a kind of "show me" announcement to the Govt - "Look! We are doing something, now what have you got for us?" and only when the Govt shows the extent to which it will come to the party will QF reveal the rest of its hand.

The interesting stuff is still to come IMO.

 

[QF029]

Is it me or is David Flynn's article in the SMH / Age incorrect about the retired 747s? My understanding is that the ER version has been refurbed and kept and the ones being removed from service were Skybed MKI for example

Flights from Sydney and Brisbane to the Asian hub will be downgraded from Boeing 747 jumbo jets to Airbus A330 aircraft by September this year.Ageing and fuel-guzzling they may be, but these jumbos were recently refitted with the same premium economy seats, lie-flat beds in business class and widescreen inflight video displays as Qantas' flagship Airbus A380.


Read more: How the Qantas cuts will hit passengers

 

[Thunder Down Under]

Anybody else cut up their QFF card and returned it ?

TDU

 

[markis10]

This just looks like the first step in a wider process, a kind of "show me" announcement to the Govt - "Look! We are doing something, now what have you got for us?" and only when the Govt shows the extent to which it will come to the party will QF reveal the rest of its hand.

The interesting stuff is still to come IMO.

I agree, we have just heard the easy bits to decide.

 

[Sumnerned]

Air nz dont have a virgin in their backyard either.

But they do have a Jetstar. And used to have a Virgin and a QANTAS until they brought them to their knees.