Qantas brand badly tarnished

[NM]

The only surprising thing here is that Qantas is still even in the top 20!

I find the most surprising thing that the media and some people here place any weight on Skytrax ratings.

 

[TheInsider]

You don’t think the new CEO will bring in any new initiatives?

Of course she will, and then it will take years to implement. Just like every other announcement Qantas makes, except for raising fares.

 

[dajop]

I find the most surprising thing that the media and some people here place any weight on Skytrax ratings.

Skytrax fill a vacuum so it is not surprising that the media, hungry for content, seize on it.

 

[NM]

Skytrax fill a vacuum so it is not surprising that the media, hungry for content, seize on it.

Yep, and I apply as much weight to that vacuum as I do the vacuum of space. Not that I can suggest any alternate method for such rankings. I don't thick there is a truly independent and realistic process for such measurements.

 

[Seat0B]

May be paywalled- try 12ft – Hop any paywall

Thanks for this link @RooFlyer - it's a beauty!

 

[RichardMEL]

I find the most surprising thing that the media and some people here place any weight on Skytrax ratings.

Beat me to it

Most industry insiders, including some I know personally who are very highly regarded, all agree with the nature of SkyTrax. The kindest thing I heard said is "Dubious" Seemingly it's more related to the spend an airline has. The metrics they use are opaque so who would really know.

Favoured more by marketing types to brag about things like "5 star airline" and so on, and looks good, but realities are it's not exactly accurate. I mean people just need to use their noggin and wonder how carriers like IB get so high up, or AC seemingly rated as "best for families" and so on. Doesn't really pass the pub test.

Having written all that, I mean the top few winners are no shock and I think most people who have any experience with any or all of them would tend to agree that the likes of QR, SQ, NH etc would all rate very highly for onboard product and service, younger aircraft and overall leading design hard products (think QSuite, or SQ A380 new Suites) blow most others away - along with lounge offerings and so on.

So the usual top 3-5 are probably fairly universally agreed upon.. some others.. not so much and some listings see a head scratch.

 

[MooTime]

Beat me to it

Most industry insiders, including some I know personally who are very highly regarded, all agree with the nature of SkyTrax. The kindest thing I heard said is "Dubious" Seemingly it's more related to the spend an airline has. The metrics they use are opaque so who would really know.

Favoured more by marketing types to brag about things like "5 star airline" and so on, and looks good, but realities are it's not exactly accurate. I mean people just need to use their noggin and wonder how carriers like IB get so high up, or AC seemingly rated as "best for families" and so on. Doesn't really pass the pub test.

Having written all that, I mean the top few winners are no shock and I think most people who have any experience with any or all of them would tend to agree that the likes of QR, SQ, NH etc would all rate very highly for onboard product and service, younger aircraft and overall leading design hard products (think QSuite, or SQ A380 new Suites) blow most others away - along with lounge offerings and so on.

So the usual top 3-5 are probably fairly universally agreed upon.. some others.. not so much and some listings see a head scratch.

You @RichardMEL continue to be the best voice across the AFF board by far.
I admire you honest opinion & view, QF P1 yet post on QF topics so fairly + & - it's really amazing considering others posts etc...... I read your posts with much interest.

Keep up the good work! Now Hi-5 yourself.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Having written all that, I mean the top few winners are no shock and I think most people who have any experience with any or all of them would tend to agree that the likes of QR, SQ, NH etc would all rate very highly for onboard product and service, younger aircraft and overall leading design hard products (think QSuite, or SQ A380 new Suites) blow most others away - along with lounge offerings and so on.

So the usual top 3-5 are probably fairly universally agreed upon.. some others.. not so much and some listings see a head scratch.

Well… the ‘top five’ are based on access via what? Award availability and having enough people being able to fly?

The likes of Lufthansa F, or Air France F, which are very hard to come by award-wise, don’t get a mention. And Air France F is probably the best product in the world taking into account onboard food, lounges and ground handling. Lufthansa is not far behind. Granted LH’s rest of product is pretty dismal, although the food in business is pretty good.

 

[Quickstatus]

Seemingly it's more related to the spend an airline has

So QF didnt pay enough $$$?

 

[RooFlyer]

So the usual top 3-5 are probably fairly universally agreed upon.. some others.. not so much and some listings see a head scratch.

Agree; but maybe Skytrax has its most value in seeing the change in rankings year-on-year. We joke about paying $$ for ratings - so, did Qantas fork out a lot to Skytrax previously, but not this year?

Well… the ‘top five’ are based on access via what? Award availability and having enough people being able to fly?

I don't think it has anything to do with Award availability has it? Methodology here.
______________

They say People's Choice is based on customer surveys; for all the joking & bad-mouthing here, what's the evidence that there is some sort of corruption ($$ for ranking) at work here? Genuine question. I recall a few years back something about an airline getting a ranking way above what it 'should have', can someone remind me?

As others have said, the top placements are not surprising, so I question why the implications that its a dodgy system. I'm pretty chuffed that my 2 favourite airlines, SQ and QR are 1 and 2, and NH, who I'm going to start flying next year is #3; Turkish who I like and who I also will be flying next year, #6. LH, my other go-to next year disappointing at #21.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I don't think it has anything to do with Award availability has it? Methodology here.
______________

But who are all these customers jetting around in first and business class filling out these surveys? Easy to First and business class seats on the likes of emirates, cathay, singapore, ANA etc. Very hard on flights like Oman, Air france, lufthansa.

Or are all the folk who just dropped $20k for a first class return ticket on SQ dropping by the skytrax to fill it a survey?

 

[dajop]

or Air France F, which are very hard to come by award-wise, don’t get a mention.

#2 First Class and #7 overall (and someone - not sure if it was this thread or another thread - suggested Air France being as high as #7 was evidence that the awards are not to be believed). Highlights how subjective opinions and therefore any sort of awards are!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

#2 First Class and #7 overall (and someone - not sure if it was this thread or another thread - suggested Air France being as high as #7 was evidence that the awards are not to be believed). Highlights how subjective opinions and therefore any sort of awards are!

Thanks for that! Shows maybe I need to read deeper than the headlines!

Going back to the point I was making above… the number of video and written flight reviews seems to be. directly proportional to a couple of factors… award availability, or alternatively the (low) price of a paid ticket. There aren’t too many influencers or bloggers shelling out $10k plus per trip report. Travel writers and journalists ‘flying as a guest of the airline’ rarely seem to be given tickets on high-value, high-premium flights where seats are scare and they have pax to fill them.

The QF call centre is bad. But I’m surprised they didn’t rank much higher because their on-board offering is pretty good in economy, premium Y and business.

 

[ozflier]

Having flown in Business on most of the airlines ahead of QF, I agree with the results - You can get a great flight on Qantas with terrific staff but on the whole , the substandard soft and hard product and " Its not my job to clean the toilets" mentality <redacted>
And, I am prepared to pay extra for the pleasure .
Now if I could only get rid of my QFF points - there are only so many Qantas Shop toasters and small appliances I can give away as presents!

 

[Melburnian1]

Internationally though QF's market share is under 40% IIRC and dropping. look at carriers like QR and SQ who are upping capacity and flights to major AU cities (and even smaller ones, like return to CNS with the Max).. I noticed at MEL the other day there were 4 SIN flights on SQ - 2 of them in the space of 3 hours. That is very impressive. Mother QF only the one (plus JQ).

You have greatly overestimated QFi's market share.

BITRE has fallen behind with its monthly international air passenger statistics. The latest month made public is January 2023, when QFi had market share of 17 per cent and JQi 11 per cent.

So fewer than three in 10 international journeys by air to/from Oz see the QF group brands used by travellers.

As evidenced in a previous AFF article by Mattg and some recent mainstream media coverage, QR is restricted in flights it can operate to/from our nation but as you may recall, it's lobbying for more access. QF would be guaranteed to be lobbying hard against that.

Mainland Chinese airlines are slowly returning flights. Having not paid any attention, I was surprised to observe Xiamen Airlines (quite a good reputation, but I have no desire to ever again visit mainland communist China or Hong Kong) has a daily frequency to and from Melbourne. These airlines will provide a bit more competition, though I suspect the number of Australians travelling on them is well down on the pre-COVID total. International student numbers studying in person in Australia also remain well below the 2019 level.

 

[Melburnian1]

But planes are full, profits high...

Two reasons 'planes are full' on QF include that many through corporates/government departments and agencies are wedded to QFd, and to a lesser extent QFi, because domestically, alternative carriers lack the route network of QFd.

Secondly, as discussed elsewhere, on some routes such as London, QFi has over the years dramatically reduced seating capacity. Yet Australia's population has soared compared to 30 years ago.

If you took a decade or 15 year view the 'profits' story isn't nearly as good. If businesses like QF delay capital expendture on expensive new aircraft, that can make 'profit' higher, but it can be (long term) a mirage if the clunky old aircraft begin to have a cost per seat km disadvantage compared to other airlines.

 

[RooFlyer]

But who are all these customers jetting around in first and business class filling out these surveys? Easy to First and business class seats on the likes of emirates, cathay, singapore, ANA etc. Very hard on flights like Oman, Air france, lufthansa.

Or are all the folk who just dropped $20k for a first class return ticket on SQ dropping by the skytrax to fill it a survey?

Sure it’s a subjective methodology, no disagreement there. I guess we’d have to dig into the actual spread of responses to know how subjective.

But again, maybe the most useful part of the surveys are the year on year changes, to track how various Airlines are performing, and not only relative to each other, but relative to their own past performance.

The QF call centre is bad. But I’m surprised they didn’t rank much higher because their on-board offering is pretty good in economy, premium Y and business.

Yes, but others are better I reckon. Honestly, seriously, they are ( speaking about J and F only for international).

EDIT I certainly don’t think Qantas is number 17 and I haven’t flown on a number of those ranked above it. But as I said above, the airline has managed to pi** off a large number of people over the past year and dissatisfied customers I think are more likely to fill in a survey than satisfied ones. Maybe that’s the explanation.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Sure it’s a subjective methodology, no disagreement there. I guess we’d have to dig into the actual spread of responses to know how subjective.

But again, maybe the most useful part of the surveys are the year on year changes, to track how various Airlines are performing, and not only relative to each other, but relative to their own past performance.


Yes, but others are better I reckon. Honestly, seriously, they are ( speaking about J and F only for international).

EDIT I certainly don’t think Qantas is number 17 and I haven’t flown on a number of those ranked above it. But as I said above, the airline has managed to pi** off a large number of people over the past year and dissatisfied customers I think are more likely to fill in a survey than satisfied ones. Maybe that’s the explanation.

Yes, there are better F and J products than QF. No doubt. But i agree with you that #17 is very harsh.

I hadn’t thought about year on year rankings. Some value in that.

How SQ manages to pull off these awards leaves me slightly scratching my head. Maybe compared to US carriers? But post covid SQ has had a noticeable decline in things like food.

 

[dajop]

Im am genuinely surprised that people are surprised that QF have dropped the number of places they have. And it’s not just Skytrax surveys that suggest the trust in the brand has dropped.

Remember the vast majority of pax rating an airline are not WP’s sitting back and enjoying the F lounge.

Anecdote 1 - relative who hasn’t flown QF for some time on an SYD-MEL dinner flight suggested the three pastries in a box were hardly “dinner” more like a snack. (QF are good at creating high expectations, their marketing team is arguably the best in Australia, but they seem to fail in meeting those expectations )

Anecdote 2 - from my sister who before this year had never flown j. Now has on UA and QF to US in separate trips - comment was UA was more comfortable and better overall experience.

There are also a number of posters on here who have suggested the AA experience domestically for years a poor cousin of QF - now is better than QF.

These are all just anecdotes, but they do add up And that’s without getting into baggage handling or offshore call centres.

 

[jrfsp]

100% agree with the QF marketing and expectations which is also followed up by QF fares. What has become hard to justify is the Qantas fare premium.

People are happy to pay a premium for a premium service but post covid the service is the same (or worse) than other cheaper carriers.