What will SQ add to the route for Australia?
Only red ink. They will not do anything to lower fares as they just want to profit and plunder.
The latest stats on the Dept of Transport website are for September 2004. Inbound to Oz, they say that QF had a load factor of 70.1% with UAL having a reported load factor of 78.8%. Outbound, the numbers are 74.9% and 84.5% respectively. So both carriers are operating with q lot of empty seats. Sure in peak periods the numbers increase to nearly 100% but generally Sept would be indicative of the year round experience. The numbers show a healthy increase over the previous year but it is still recovering from 911 and the poor US economy.
And we can't think that the route is a monopoly for Qantas - United in all its bulk is still there. Air Pacific, Air New Zealand, Air Canada and Hawaiian all offer direct services to Nth America and they will be joined by Air Tahiti Niue in the next few months. Finally, the bottom feeders like Korean, Asiana, EVA, China Airlines and some other Asian carriers are carting the price conscious market via Asoia to connect with their many services to/from nth America. With all that is available, what really can SQ add?
The argument that QF through JetStar Asia is also specious. We could offset that by saying that SQ has a significant interest in Virgin Atlantic which has just started operations to Oz so the score is one each!! The impact that VS has on the Australian markert will be more significant than the puny impact of Jet*Asia will have in WSSS.
It will be a tragedy for Australia if Canberra gives in to the parasites that are SQ, and any other carrier that offers Australia so little in return. Let us learn the lessons from being overly generous to Emirates. At the risk of being cynical, may I ask if the bureaucrats in Canberra are paid performance bonuses by 'resolving' outstanding issues such as the SQ claim for traffic rights on the Pacific?