Rex in voluntary administration, ending all 737 services

[RB]

This is how things look for flights to Port Macquarie in Sept (date we want to travel). Just QantasLink and Rex to/from Sydney. Used to be around 230,000 passengers yr but can't find current numbers. We don't seem to appear in seat sales

 

[ANstar]

VA1 lost of money in their vanity project, but DJ was a sound business before they tried upping the ante on QF (DJ is essentially what VA2 has become).

DJ was a sound business but lets not forget it started to lose a bit of it's shine once Jetstar was established to take on the lower end of the market - hence why they decided to adapt their business model.

 

[Harrison_133]

The Albanese Government has announced it will guarantee regional flight bookings for Rex customers during the voluntary administration process.

The guarantee is for bookings made after Rex entered voluntary administration at 9:31pm on 30 July 2024. It means travellers will have certainty they will either fly or get their money back.

Press release here: Flight guaranteed for regional Rex customers

 

[servicerequired]

The Albanese Government has announced it will guarantee regional flight bookings for Rex customers during the voluntary administration process.

The guarantee is for bookings made after Rex entered voluntary administration at 9:31pm on 30 July 2024. It means travellers will have certainty they will either fly or get their money back.

Press release here: Flight guaranteed for regional Rex customers

It should only be on the REX exclusive and State Government subsidised / partnership routes. Let the free market do its thing.

The Q300 from MQL-MEL was jammed on Thursday night … packed to the brim.

Slay QF mainline as you will, but don’t tar Eastern Australia and Sunstate with the same brush.

 

[Mattg]

The Albanese Government has announced it will guarantee regional flight bookings for Rex customers during the voluntary administration process.

The guarantee is for bookings made after Rex entered voluntary administration at 9:31pm on 30 July 2024. It means travellers will have certainty they will either fly or get their money back.

Press release here: Flight guaranteed for regional Rex customers

I suspect they’ve done this for the same reason the federal government guarantees banking deposits. The fact that they do it instills confidence, which means people won’t try to withdraw all their money if they’re worried the bank might collapse - which in itself would cause the bank to collapse if enough people did it.

Rex is obviously a bit different to a bank, and the risk is probably a bit higher that the government might need to pay up. But Rex really needs cash flow right now if they are to survive. If this convinces enough people to book with Rex when they may have otherwise hesitated, it will have served its purpose.

 

[RooFlyer]

The Albanese Government has announced it will guarantee regional flight bookings for Rex customers during the voluntary administration process.

Bit of a vote of confidence for Rex. I think the government would be very reluctant to provide a guarantee if they thought the thing might fall over ( and they would have seen the Administrator's books) and then be on the hook for quite a lot of money.

Providing a guarantee instills confidence and makes the failure of airline less likely and the guarantee less likely to be called upon, so it’s a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy.

Having the Airline survive and probably trade its way out of its current situation means its creditors will be paid much more than they would otherwise.

So the guarantee is hopefuly a zero cost win-win-win all round.

 

[Quickstatus]

Slay QF mainline as you will, but don’t tar Eastern Australia and Sunstate with the same brush.

Does Eastern and Sunstate have an independent management structure including CEO etc or is the CEO the QLink CEO?.

 

[XWu]

The Albanese Government has announced it will guarantee regional flight bookings for Rex customers during the voluntary administration process.

The guarantee is for bookings made after Rex entered voluntary administration at 9:31pm on 30 July 2024. It means travellers will have certainty they will either fly or get their money back.

Press release here: Flight guaranteed for regional Rex customers

Obviously reassuring for travelers, but for most regional pax, they rather have the flights not the cash if there is a choice. At current petrol prices and travel time involved, few saved any money by driving, not to mention fatigue.
And few rely on train for “day trips”

 

[Ansett Nostalgic]

Probably helps that Albo is an ex Transport Minister who likes to think of himself as some kind of transport expert.

 

[Saab34]

The AFR has reported that Virgin attempted twice to buy the 737 operation. It seems like LKH didn’t want a bar of that. I don’t know what sort of price you would put on that, but would enable Virgin to essentially grow its 737 ops overnight by 10% with associated crews, spare parts, leases. Seems like an attractive deal.

The sad thing is, ego got in the way. Certainly would have been beneficial for the 600 odd workers who now are unemployed.

LKH seems like a nice bloke.

 

[HS-TQE]

The other co-Founder (and former board member) of REX Michael Jones alongside with former VA CEO Scurrah also formed a consortium to buy REX in Q4 2023. LKH brushed them off as well.

Interestingly, there have been some attempts to buy REX but ego got in the way of LKH before their Private Equity funders and co-owners PAG put the foot down and successfully initiated their plan to overthrow LKH from the board.

 

[Saab34]

It actually would have been good for passengers and pricing also if Virgin was able to pick up the fleet and staff. It’s quite frustrating that it didn’t occur, wouldn’t have cost a cent of taxpayer dollars, now the ego card has been dealt, the only losers are staff, customers, and taxpayers.

Thanks LKH!

 

[HS-TQE]

There has been some blessings in disguise however, the 30+ year old Saabs and the handful of 21-year old 738s would've been an recurring reliability under Bain ownership with the CapEx required to replace that fleet.

 

[Saab34]

There has been some blessings in disguise however, the 30+ year old Saabs and the handful of 21-year old 738s would've been an recurring reliability under Bain ownership with the CapEx required to replace that fleet.

From reading the AFR article it seems like they would have just taken the 737s with crews.

 

[Harrison_133]

LKH seems like a nice bloke.

The AFR and the Australian are both now reporting that the AFP are investigating after it's alleged he illegally recorded the final board meeting.

The circus continues.

 

[Saab34]

Is this ASIC doc public? Cant seem to see it.

Documents lodged with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission showed the extent of Rex’s debts to employees, airports, catering companies, engineering firms and even a florist.

Qantas was owed sums totalling close to $100,000; the Byron Bay Cookie Company was out of pocket by $44,500 and Rex had run up a debt of $2.7m with Airservices Australia.

 

[gaz0303]

The Australian reporting that Rex was trying to sell surplus Saabs prior to administration (according to EY). Seems to contradict previous reasons about regional route closures.

Or did they mean trying to sell scrap metal?

 

[henrus]

Or did they mean trying to sell scrap metal?

Maybe coke cola was interested to use that metal to make some more cans

 

[Harrison_133]

In the ABC today, staff have been told another 73 roles will be made redundant on top of the almost 600 who have already been axed.

Among the roles being made redundant within the business are aircraft support officers and team leaders, customer services officers, ground school trainees, flight/pilot trainees and call centre operators.

The additional redundancies will see Rex's total employee headcount reduced to about 1,200 staff — about the same number of workers the business had prior to its failed expansion to capital city services and the COVID-19 pandemic.

It is also reported that the second creditors meeting is expected to take place in the first week of September.

Source: Administrators for Rex to axe another 73 jobs at troubled regional airline

 

[Saab34]

No idea why they even still sat on the books. Unless you are connected to the Saab operation, it’s farewell.