ACCC Draft Approval given for Virgin Australia alliance with Singapore Airlines

[Virgin Australia]

Below is this mornings press release for the ACCC draft approval for our alliance with Singapore Airlines.

Virgin Australia welcomes ACCC draft approval of Singapore Airlines alliance

BRISBANE, 13 October 2011: Virgin Australia group of airlines (ASX: VBA) today welcomed the ACCC’s draft approval of its proposed alliance with Singapore Airlines.
The proposed alliance will enable the two airlines to provide guests with an expanded network of destinations, seamless connections, a more convenient flight schedule and more opportunities to earn frequent flyer points and access lounges.
Virgin Australia group of airlines CEO John Borghetti said: “We welcome the ACCC’s draft approval of our
proposed alliance with Singapore Airlines. The alliance will enable us to deliver an attractive and competitive
service for travellers in Australia and Asia.”
“The proposed Singapore Airlines alliance is a key plank in Virgin Australia’s strategy to build an international network of airline partners that offers global coverage.
“The alliance would also be very positive for Australian tourism, including Regional Australia, as both airlines will promote Australia in many cities throughout Asia”, Mr Borghetti said.
The ACCC is expected to make its final ruling following public comments on the proposal. The two airlines are also awaiting approval from the Competition Commission of Singapore (CCS).

We know that many of you are excited by this alliance, and have many questions as to how the relationship will work for you.
Today's news brings us one step closer to revealing all.
Rest assured we will provide as many details as we can, as soon as we can!

 

[awilcockson]

Bring it on!!

 

[pauly7]

Great, selfishly - please hurry and get SQ integrated into Velocity to book FF seats so I can fly SQ to Europe rather than EY

 

[cove]

This is very good news for our family.

 

[kamchatsky]

Great, selfishly - please hurry and get SQ integrated into Velocity to book FF seats so I can fly SQ to Europe rather than EY

What's wrong with EY? I thought they are one of the better ones out there?

 

[mannej]

What's wrong with EY? I thought they are one of the better ones out there?

EY doesn't serve every port out of AU for one.

 

[cove]

Yes that is the EY problem for us in Perth.
SQ have got the flights for us.

 

[oz_mark]

Yes that is the EY problem for us in Perth.
SQ have got the flights for us.

The proposal was that PER originating pax would have access to SQ through to London, as there was no EY service.

 

[Noob]

The proposal was that PER originating pax would have access to SQ through to London, as there was no EY service.

Yeah, that will be the only VA codeshare SIA flight to LHR right?

 

[smit0847]

What's wrong with EY? I thought they are one of the better ones out there?

It's a rapidly declining airline in terms of customer satisfaction. It used to be equal with Emirates - no longer.

I would love to fly to AUH with VA (even if I have to fly out of Sydney) as I think they are terrific but would not do so because I then have to fly EY onwards. Thats why I will choose QR or EK for my trip next year.

From AirlineQuality . com

Cases in point:
Etihad Airways customer review : 3 October 2011 by G Macpherson (Australia)

Economy

[TD="width: 128"] Trip Rating : 4/10
[/TD]
[TD="width: 116"][/TD]
[TD="width: 85"] Recommended:
[/TD]
[TD="width: 61"][/TD]
[TD="width: 94"] Value for Money:
[/TD]
[TD="width: 67"][/TD]
[TD="width: 74"] Cabin Flown:
[/TD]

​

Sydney to London Heathrow. As the flight was codeshare we were unable to check-in online and so had a long wait at Sydney check-in. Flight on Virgin Australia good with excellent entertainment, and reasonable food. Changing at Abu Dhabi we were delayed with little information and no seating. The plane to London was old and tired, food was awful and the plane was cramped, and I am only 5 ft 2. Sleeping was interrupted by the pinging of lots of unanswered call bells. Etihad Airways customer review : 31 August 2011 by P Redmond (UK)

​

Had been expecting something like Qatar Airways who we travelled with in 2010 to Bangkok. Sorry to report that these Etihad flights were fairly poor - not really bad, but just poor. Staff service perfunctory at best, but on 2 flights the staff seemed to spend a lot of time arguing amongst themselves. The make all sorts of claims about leading airline titles, but the truth is they are nowhere near what we experienced on Qatar Airways.


Etihad Airways customer review : 27 August 2011 by J Curran (UK)

Economy

[TD="width: 128"] Trip Rating : 1/10
[/TD]
[TD="width: 116"][/TD]
[TD="width: 85"] Recommended:
[/TD]
[TD="width: 61"][/TD]
[TD="width: 94"] Value for Money:
[/TD]
[TD="width: 67"][/TD]
[TD="width: 74"] Cabin Flown:
[/TD]

​

Manchester to Sydney return. The seats were cramped, and I was given a dirty pillow - when I asked for a clean one, the staff was rather rude. The cabin crew were abrupt and we got missed out rather a lot when being served. The food was very repetitive, and it is true about being given apot noodle! On a 14 hour flight, we got given 2 cups of water, a small cup of tea, 1 drink with a meal. The entertainment system was awful - my daughter sat for the first flight holding her headphones into the arm rest so she could hear sound, and the touch screen on her tv didn't work so she struggled to put films on etc. Etihad are not worth the money spent on them, I would rather spend a little bit extra and go with a decent airline. I would not class them a four star airline. It was more like a charter flight, except we had tv's. Abu Dhabi airport is easy to get lost and nobody is very helpful.


Etihad Airways customer review : 30 July 2011 by Faris Moalmi (Saudi Arabia)

Economy

[TD="width: 128"] Trip Rating : 3/10
[/TD]
[TD="width: 116"][/TD]
[TD="width: 85"] Recommended:
[/TD]
[TD="width: 61"][/TD]
[TD="width: 94"] Value for Money:
[/TD]
[TD="width: 67"][/TD]
[TD="width: 74"] Cabin Flown:
[/TD]

​

SYD-AUH was my return flight from Australia, the outbound was by Virgin, who were amazing. Check in staff in UAE and Australia are inexperienced. They helped me with good seating, but nothing else. Seats were okay at best, food was bad. Service was okay for most part, but bordered on rude with some attendants. I would not fly them again.





Would love it if VA just used AUH as a fuel stop and went on the same plane straight to LHR like QF do with SIN.

Or if their alliance was with Qatar Airways, one of the most underrated airlines in the world.

 

[airtraveladdict]

Yep I agree with all of the above.

Etihad is rapidly declining, and makes me wish V Australia would fly all the way to Europe/UK, because I'm not a fan of EY and Abu Dhabi airport. And I was sucked in by the flashy ads on newspapers.

But after two flights with EY and getting pretty much the same experience, although the second time, the service was "slightly" better than the first one

They have a great inflight entertainment system but that is about it.

And they USED to have a good a FF, but EY recently changed their Etihad Guest program, so to redeem flights from Australia to Europe, we require almost 2x points. And if you want to upgrade, you need almost as many points as redeeming a flight, its only a 10-20k points difference. But if you are living in Europe or Asia, the program is a WIN WIN for you because the points required for redemption and upgrades is less under the new changes.

Although having said that, I compared it to Velocity, it appears that EY have increased their points requirements for redemption and upgrades to be inline with Velocity. But an Etihad Guest member still requires less points to redeem a flight compared to Velocity, I.e. (since we can't upgrade on international yet on V Australia) Sydney-Abu Dhabi-Paris Business class one way is 141,800 velocity points VS 138,765 Etihad Guest or in First Class, its 212,700 Velocity points VS 174,263 Etihad Guest Miles, miles for the same flight.

Anyway I welcome more choices because it means I can earn FF and hopefully (please pleaes) SC as well for trips to Asia on Singapore Airlines.

 

[airtraveladdict]

It's a rapidly declining airline in terms of customer satisfaction. It used to be equal with Emirates - no longer.

I would love to fly to AUH with VA (even if I have to fly out of Sydney) as I think they are terrific but would not do so because I then have to fly EY onwards. Thats why I will choose QR or EK for my trip next year.

Would love it if VA just used AUH as a fuel stop and went on the same plane straight to LHR like QF do with SIN.

Or if their alliance was with Qatar Airways, one of the most underrated airlines in the world.

Ditto, VA please partner with Qatar or somebody else who is better than Etihad or fly all the way to Europe, via Singapore or Hong Kong.

Alas... I guess its abit hard to do that because they only have 5x 777ER, they need a bigger fleet to be able to service Europe. Which i would welcome because I love VA premium economy product (since i cant afford business all the time), crew are amazing, the food is so so, but the crew, seat, dedicated cabin & toilets, check-in, entertainment are great. Just wish they would stop lifting their prices LOL, they are getting as expensive as Air New Zealand (all the way to London in Premium Economy) and are $1000-$1,200 dearer than JAL Premium Economy Sydney-Narita-European city (All the way + lounge access at the Sakura Lounge), whereas VA's premium economy is only on the Sydney-Abu Dhabi leg and then its economy on Etihad to Europe.

I've never experienced Emirates before, but VA was partnered with Emirates before they divorced and VA and Etihad starting courting each other.

I wonder if this means, VA will fly to Singapore and then Singapore Airlines will fly you to Europe.

 

[ozmille]

Or if their alliance was with Qatar Airways, one of the most underrated airlines in the world.

They are a Skytrax 5 star airline.

 

[xtoss]

Funny enough my experience with etihad was similar.

From AUH-LHR the plane was an older one and definitely felt cramped. Service wasn't the best either.

On the way back service was awesome and the plane felt newer and fresher. (not I wasn't just tired and fresh, the business class in the first plane was older compared to the second leg so I knew the planes were different).

Having said that, the return leg VA from AUH to SYD in premium wasn't the best... my seat was busted and they could do nothing to fix it.. kept slipping under me as you would sit, I asked the guy about it at the beginning saying it is slipping on recline and he said "does it bother you that bad" as if I was being a whinger, not exactly the "premium" response I was looking for... show some sympathy, I'm about to sit down for 14 hours on a seat that is slipping (as I show sympathy back as you're about to work for 14 hours). I understand it wasn't going to be fixed but just felt like he didn't care about it and making it seem like I was making an issue out of nothing

 

[airtraveladdict]

Funny enough my experience with etihad was similar.

From AUH-LHR the plane was an older one and definitely felt cramped. Service wasn't the best either.

On the way back service was awesome and the plane felt newer and fresher. (not I wasn't just tired and fresh, the business class in the first plane was older compared to the second leg so I knew the planes were different).

Having said that, the return leg VA from AUH to SYD in premium wasn't the best... my seat was busted and they could do nothing to fix it.. kept slipping under me as you would sit, I asked the guy about it at the beginning saying it is slipping on recline and he said "does it bother you that bad" as if I was being a whinger, not exactly the "premium" response I was looking for... show some sympathy, I'm about to sit down for 14 hours on a seat that is slipping (as I show sympathy back as you're about to work for 14 hours). I understand it wasn't going to be fixed but just felt like he didn't care about it and making it seem like I was making an issue out of nothing

thats a shame about the response you got, the crew on both my flights in Premium were great. Which seat number in Premium Econ was broken? was the cabin full because they should have moved you.

And yeh, Etihad are impressive when they do the spiel "we can speak 8 languages on this flight, german, arabic, indian, mandarin, japanese, english, french, turkish"...and i think yeh yeh, but do they speak "customer service"?? no lol

 

[xtoss]

thats a shame about the response you got, the crew on both my flights in Premium were great. Which seat number in Premium Econ was broken? was the cabin full because they should have moved you.

And yeh, Etihad are impressive when they do the spiel "we can speak 8 languages on this flight, german, arabic, indian, mandarin, japanese, english, french, turkish"...and i think yeh yeh, but do they speak "customer service"?? no lol

On the way back we had a very nice Etihad hostess so it made the flight a lot better than on the way there

yeah I've flown the LAX route in premium before this and also had great service. 3/4 times I've flown were good. the 4th one wasn't bad but it just wasn't up to the other experiences, plus the whole seat issue probably didn't help my outlook.

No other spare seats and never really came back to see if it was any better or worse in the flight, I knew premium was packed though as I had booked early and could only get 14 C at the time

 

[airtraveladdict]

On the way back we had a very nice Etihad hostess so it made the flight a lot better than on the way there

yeah I've flown the LAX route in premium before this and also had great service. 3/4 times I've flown were good. the 4th one wasn't bad but it just wasn't up to the other experiences, plus the whole seat issue probably didn't help my outlook.

No other spare seats and never really came back to see if it was any better or worse in the flight, I knew premium was packed though as I had booked early and could only get 14 C at the time

You got a nice hostess on etihad, wow.

I reckon that premium product is a big $$$ maker for virgin, because that cabin always seems to be near capacity or packed, there was only 1 spare seat from syd-auh which was the 14E or F, i cant remember. but on the return AUH-sydney, it was packed.
Anyway hopefully your experience with VA was a one-off, because considering it is a dedicated cabin with 2 attendants to 38-40 people, they could have checked up on you. I remember when i got on my AUH-syd flight, i was so tired, I literally sat down and fell asleep as the plane was boarding and when i woke up hours later, a cabin crew asked if i wanted to have my dinner now because i missed the service since i was asleep.

 

[xtoss]

You got a nice hostess on etihad, wow.

I reckon that premium product is a big $$$ maker for virgin, because that cabin always seems to be near capacity or packed, there was only 1 spare seat from syd-auh which was the 14E or F, i cant remember. but on the return AUH-sydney, it was packed.
Anyway hopefully your experience with VA was a one-off, because considering it is a dedicated cabin with 2 attendants to 38-40 people, they could have checked up on you. I remember when i got on my AUH-syd flight, i was so tired, I literally sat down and fell asleep as the plane was boarding and when i woke up hours later, a cabin crew asked if i wanted to have my dinner now because i missed the service since i was asleep.

Every premium I have been on is always sold out.

Yeah i think it would be a one off, it felt as if the whole crew were missing one or two people and it felt like premium had 1 and a half people. One girl seemed to be running around doing a lot and the guy appeared only for meals. Don't know how else to explain it but it just felt slightly below other experiences.

 

[airtraveladdict]

Every premium I have been on is always sold out.

Yeah i think it would be a one off, it felt as if the whole crew were missing one or two people and it felt like premium had 1 and a half people. One girl seemed to be running around doing a lot and the guy appeared only for meals. Don't know how else to explain it but it just felt slightly below other experiences.

Well I know that the premium crew sometimes cover for the economy class also when it gets too busy, which happened on my flight. And i didn't think they did that, LOL because after watching Come Fly with Me, where the Business class hostess sat back for a champagne because she didnt have any passengers in business for the flight, and the customer service manager asked her to help out in economy because it was packed and she did the "oh the horror the horror". anyway

yeah VA's premium is always packed and when economy is packed too, the premium cabin crew helps out, which is why they were absent.

I think VA should consider expanding their premium product like turkish airline, which has 63 premium economy class on their 777 and they are 46 inch seat pitch, YES 46 inches!!! and 3x dedicated cabin crew.

VA is only 38 inch pitch, so they wont have to sacrifice too many economy seats to make way for 60 premium economy seats, right now they have 288 and turkish airlines has 246.

 

[Justchecking]

I wouldnt be surprised to see PE become the new economy for the slightly well-er to do while backpacker class shrinks as a proportion. For people like myself who don't fly very regularly, I'm happy to fork out the extra $$ for a nicer experience on my twice a year sojourns. The joys of saving a few hundred wear off about 4hrs into the flight.