Originally Posted by
plainmaker
I think this is AJ's way of getting rid of the TWU - who are a PITA as far as management are concerned. I assume that this also means the demise of the old Qantas Transport team - those who used to do the crew transfers QCC to airside and return, plus tech crew home transport? (Showing my age now).
Used to be that Ground handling was a very profitable part of the Qantas Airports 'division' - recall many times costing up bids for other airlines handling at SYD International. Critical issue was when you had an AOG close to the curfew, you had your own staff to handle the pax to hotels exercise (and return). TWU used to be rostered until 0100, so the staff was on hand. A certain accountant put paid to that and it only took several weeks before the late LAX departure went tech. So due to Flight time limitations, new crew to be called out and the service was a no-go. The pax had to shuffled off to hotels etc, but the TWU pulled the 'sorry no overtime' and shot through when the shift was due to finish. Took an eternity for the pax to get to their hotels, only to be waken up for a 0600 departure. Would like to have been a fly on the wall as the (few) management did the bags, organised the transfers and hotels, Plus did all the rebookings for the displaced pax. And our American brethren were SO accommodating and flexible in their requests! Heard through the grapevine the overall 'impact' was in excess of $100k and that was in the early 90's.
Seems they never learn about the full outsource model - no 'ownership', no loyalty, and in the end it hurts your business. Ask PanAm and TWA.
Pan Am until the day they stopped operating to Australia had their own staff on their counters... that was the case with PA just about everywhere, one of the reasons their costs were so high.