Originally Posted by
griffin one
what a narcissistic comment.
in the 80,S and 90,S Qantas handled just about every international operator through Sydney.they kept costs down by having multiple contracts.
Management decided to terminate contracts and this has the flow on effect of higher overheads.
I wish all staff effected by this decision the very best outcome.
Firstly, it's 'affected' not 'effected' and secondly, that monopoly that Qantas had (well, not really, you have chosen not to mention Ansett and TAA/Australian who also had handling operations so Qantas didn't handle every carrier) was broken when independent ground handlers were allowed to start operating at major airports (like every other airport overseas for decades). The marginal cost that Qantas was able to charge, in exchange for a quid-pro-quo at the handled airlines' main base overseas ceased to exist. From that point, the writing was on the wall and below the wing airline ground handling was doomed.
It is simply, today, when there are multiple independent handlers, economically unviable for a company like Qantas to pay for full time employees, pay super and provide staff travel, pay payroll tax and work cover premiums, etc. for a smaller and smaller group of people when they can pay a set rate for a turnaround service that is amortised across many clients.
Qantas has been handled by contractors overseas for decades, either subsidiaries of airline businesses such as was the case in London for a time (BACH) or more frequently, by independent ground handling companies. There was no appreciable increase in mishandled baggage and the like, the load controllers were all certified by Qantas and trained by Qantas, why do you think that is, that it's able to work overseas but not here?? Do American baggage handlers and European baggage handlers have more arms and legs or extra dexterity that enables them to deliver a sometimes better service than in house staff in Australia or is it just that this 'in house' argument has been used for decades while the union has screwed the company WAY beyond what is reasonable. For goodness sake, I've heard from people still there that the union was so exploitative it'd have people paid for taking a crap at the end of their shift if they could get away with it (yes, this was actually raised at one point).
Some of these ground handlers have won awards from the likes of Singapore Airlines, et al for their level of service. The statistics that are usually quoted show less aircraft damage by ground handlers than by in house staff and certainly FAR less featherbedding and milking of penalties and bloated resource requirements.