Originally Posted by
600ft-lb
So halve the available seats with current demand ? Drive the cost of a flight from Brisbane to Sydney to $5000 ?
The major issue is the ground handling companies can't fulfil their contracts. QGS was able to handle it, the current mobs can't. It never used to take 1 hour to get the bags from the plane to the carousel. Pre 2020 I can count on 1 finger the amount of times I saw a plane fully loaded with pax and the bags hadn't started even being loaded at departure time. Today its a daily occurance. As managemnent have said they've been using 3rd party ground handlers successfully in 45 out of 55 airports around the world or something like that, maybe the ones that had 1, maybe 2 flights at a time. Not 30 flights leaving in 1 hour.
Yes, it's shameful the way QF sent the handling business to a foreign-owned entity, and I hope they lose their court appeal, and that they, or the contractor, offer jobs to former workers already trained in the task.
But meantime while they get their sh!t together, halving capacity to force an improvement in on-time performance wouldn't drive up airfares too much if strong anti-gouging laws were put in place. It would hurt airline profits, but too bad, so sad - anything to concentrate beancounters' minds.
The whole mess that has made us one of the worst performing countries in the western world will seriously damage inbound and domestic tourism, unless government, unions and airlines work together as a matter of urgency. Anyone planning a Christmas holiday in OZ had better think again.
If a SYD-BNE on QF or VA did end up costing $5000 a pop (or even $1000) REX would love it. They would of course need in-house handling. There's a whole pool of ex-QF people just waiting for the call.