Foreign crews on Jetstar, and their conditions

[MEL_Traveller]

What exemption do you mean? A company has to make money or perish.

And what rules do you refer to? For international companies? Why are almost all call centers now based overseas? Even for companies that only do business in Australia?

However JQ wants to structure its business, I think it's fair that most people would assume that a wholly domestic flight, with a separate flight number, operating between two domestic terminals, would for all intents and purposes be a domestic flight. And that domestic flight should be staffed by Australian crew on the Australian award. Claiming that this is somehow an international tag flight and therefore eligible to be staffed with international crews at a fraction of the cost (and taking away a job from an Australian) seems a bit of a stretch.

I note the issue of overseas call centres - I don't particularly like the idea - but those I guess are the same as if QF wanted to staff it's SIN-LHR flights with UK or Singapore crew. Different issue than a domestic flight within Australia.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I'm not going to begin to pretend to know the finer details here, but wasn't there a big issue with seasonal fruit pickers being paid below minimum wage at one stage in the last few years?

There was something like that... rogue operators trying to scam the system and rip off the workers. I accept there may be a need to bring in foreign staff for jobs that can't (or won't) be filled by Australians. But they should be paid under the Aussie awards, at Aussie rates. There shouldn't be a rate for foreign workers and a separate rate for Aussie workers.

 

[juddles]

.... There shouldn't be a rate for foreign workers and a separate rate for Aussie workers.

This maybe digressing from the topic, but it seems many who dislike QF enjoy airlines who pay their staff much less.......

 

[samh004]

I think it's fair that most people would assume that a wholly domestic flight, with a separate flight number, operating between two domestic terminals, would for all intents and purposes be a domestic flight. And that domestic flight should be staffed by Australian crew on the Australian award. Claiming that this is somehow an international tag flight and therefore eligible to be staffed with international crews at a fraction of the cost (and taking away a job from an Australian) seems a bit of a stretch.

Considering the number of tag flights, why does this flight that goes via DRW not just leave from the international terminal? There are plenty of others that do, so is there a larger fee that needs to be paid to do this?

 

[CaptJCool]

While dated

Crikey | News, investigations, analysis and opinion

An independent Australian website for news, investigations, analysis and opinion across politics, world affairs, business, society and culture.

blogs.crikey.com.au

Apparently tag flights are acceptable to be paid in home wage rates which is about half of the Aussie minimum wages.

You can see someone at Mascot high-fiving this victory....

Reach of the Fair Work Act
Fair Work Ombudsman v Valuair Limited (No 2) [2014] FCA 759 (24 July 2014)

 

[Vic]

Foreign Call centres ARE NOT in Australia. That's not even comparable. Why are they people who think it's perfectly acceptable for Qantas to circumvent wholly domestic rules on paying staff wages? Why defend abusing the pay system, and not giving Australians a job in Australia, in support of an unfair competitive advantage?

I've been on a few JQ domestic flights on the east coast that seemed to be clearly staffed by JQ international staff. I've even had a chat on an international JQ flight and the staff said they operated from Thailand to Sydney then domestic to Cairns (as in A320).

 

[Vic]

This maybe digressing from the topic, but it seems many who dislike QF enjoy airlines who pay their staff much less.......

What domestic Australian airlines do you mean? Jetstar is the only one that pay their staff a lot less than Qantas, and I hate jetstar more than Qantas.

 

[CaptJCool]

Perhaps we can blame these people who lap up cheap airfares.....

Revealed: Jetstar names Australia’s low fares capitals

Jetstar has analysed data over the past year and ranked the top postcodes from across the country based on the number of fares purchased for under $100.

newsroom.jetstar.com

 

[drron]

Good to see Lonnie getting the gold.

 

[theblank]

my relative was flying for Malindo (i think, he keeps changin) and he hated flying to Perth because like someone said, the airline gave him buggar all spending money, it ended up costing him quite a bit out of pocket. he would much rather overnight in asia, or just go home.

 

[Saab34]

I've been on a few JQ domestic flights on the east coast that seemed to be clearly staffed by JQ international staff. I've even had a chat on an international JQ flight and the staff said they operated from Thailand to Sydney then domestic to Cairns (as in A320).

787 crews do not operate domestic Australia. There is tag flights 787 around the domestic network which are more repositioning fights that do operate out of CNS and OOL.

Jetstar do have large mix of different backgrounds across its staff also on domestic. As do Virgin. On my last SYD-CNS , 3 out of 4 crews were Chinese speaking crews.

 

[Vic]

787 crews do not operate domestic Australia. There is tag flights 787 around the domestic network which are more repositioning fights that do operate out of CNS and OOL.

Jetstar do have large mix of different backgrounds across its staff also on domestic. As do Virgin. On my last SYD-CNS , 3 out of 4 crews were Chinese speaking crews.

I can only share the information they gave me. That information was from an A330 flight, maybe things have changed since then.
My most recent jetstar flight operating from Australia to Japan. The crew members were mostly based overseas, with only one based in Australia.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I can only share the information they gave me. That information was from an A330 flight, maybe things have changed since then.
My most recent jetstar flight operating from Australia to Japan. The crew members were mostly based overseas, with only one based in Australia.

I thought I read that the A320 crews were doing the tag flights DRW-ADL as well?

 

[esseeeayeenn]

Wait till you find out about QF's lower paid NZ crews and the domestic sectors they fly ...

 

[pangwen]

Wait till you find out about QF's lower paid NZ crews and the domestic sectors they fly ...

heh.. reminded me to re-watch this video:

 

[Vic]

Wait till you find out about QF's lower paid NZ crews and the domestic sectors they fly ...

Well, yes had a good chat with an NZ based crew member who had to operate flights to Australia, then operate to US (after required break) and same on return.

 

[Saab34]

thought I read that the A320 crews were doing the tag flights DRW-ADL as well?

That was a once off ( but from the media press that followed this I don’t think they will tempt it again) and has not happend since as there was apparently a large uproar from the pilot body, and the union was using it to spread negative press.