Virgin Australia : 315 Million Loss - How long can they survive?
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: australia
Posts: 30
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Virgins issues run deep. Legacy issues created by legacy management a long time ago, with resolution of those issues having never been resolved. Il Deuce did very little for his $46m in earnings didn’t he? Issues, where does one start:
Without a doubt, this story is to be con’t........
- Start with the day the airline floated itself on the stock market. A lemon of an investment that has never been worthy of investing in.
- Then there is the egotistical fools like Godfrey, Borghetti and an assortment of bottom feeding executive management. Some of the ‘mid-tier managers’ have been there since the beginning of the airlines life. Get rid of them! Some have never worked for another business or organisation. Time to go.
- Ground handling: some of it is contracted out, time for the rest of it to be contracted out. A waste of money employing staff on the actual VA payroll. Take load controllers, duty managers, operational management, training also. Contract it out.
- VA still has a half baked structure with a supposed business class and economy class. It’s not. It’s no comparison to its competition Qantas. For all its faults, Qantas has a defined structure of what is economy and what is business. The jets interiors reflect that. Virgin is an all economy layout with a couple of piddly differences up the front of the cabin. Not a true business class. I can’t believe these muppets still haven’t got it right after all this time.
- ‘Specialists’’: Anyone with ‘specialist’ in their job title should be dispatched to the unemployment line. Created positions for people on ‘mates rates’ or for loyalists who do nothing other than lick management’s kyber’s and drink latte’s all day. Specialists - gooone.
- Multiple fleet type: The day they branched out from 737’s was another historical day in which they started to bleed money. Ansett part 2 if you ask me. Peter Ables killed Ansett the day he stood foot in Toulouse. VA management have done no better.
- Airline acquisitions: oh Lordy, where does one start. Another series of poor executive decision making buying non-profitable or barely-profitable lemons at the wrong time. VA is still paying the price.
- How about a decent finance team? VA have blundered on fuel hedge costs endlessly over the past 19 years and still can’t get it right. And a general head office culture consisting of overpaid almost bureaucrat style employees who act as if they are in the public service.
Without a doubt, this story is to be con’t........
Lots of ground to cover, and there are 750 people who won’t agree with me, but it’s good to finally hear that something is happening that is relevant to the issues.
"‘Specialists’’: Anyone with ‘specialist’ in their job title should be dispatched to the unemployment line."
I know the word "specialist" isn't used but aren't pilots, reservations agents, operations personnel, loaders, "technicians"/engineers all specialists in their fields?
I know the word "specialist" isn't used but aren't pilots, reservations agents, operations personnel, loaders, "technicians"/engineers all specialists in their fields?
Last edited by Chris2303; 28th Aug 2019 at 23:05.
Unfortunately, too often their skills are in networking and self-promotion.
750 people being moved on will only touch the surface of waste.
Like a previous poster mentioned VA is exactly like the public service, ridiculously over staffed and everyone in the office by 930 and gone by 1430 to beat the traffic back to the gold or sunny coast... add to that it’s based in BNE which has a very limited talent pool compared to Sydney and Melbourne hence why as also mentioned quite accurately many in management there have never worked elsewhere, likely never flown JQ or QF just living in their own glorified bubble..
Good to see however the new CEO is telling it how it is and not trying to put a BS spin on the situation and talk about how amazing they are and everything was fine like the predecessor who couldn’t see past his own hubris.
I do hope PS can clean up the mess he has been left.
Like a previous poster mentioned VA is exactly like the public service, ridiculously over staffed and everyone in the office by 930 and gone by 1430 to beat the traffic back to the gold or sunny coast... add to that it’s based in BNE which has a very limited talent pool compared to Sydney and Melbourne hence why as also mentioned quite accurately many in management there have never worked elsewhere, likely never flown JQ or QF just living in their own glorified bubble..
Good to see however the new CEO is telling it how it is and not trying to put a BS spin on the situation and talk about how amazing they are and everything was fine like the predecessor who couldn’t see past his own hubris.
I do hope PS can clean up the mess he has been left.
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Brisbane
Posts: 705
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
- “‘Specialists’’: Anyone with ‘specialist’ in their job title should be dispatched to the unemployment line. Created positions for people on ‘mates rates’ or for loyalists who do nothing other than lick management’s kyber’s and drink latte’s all day. Specialists -
How long can they survive? Looking at the financials, for while longer yet. They had $1.7 billion in the bank at the end of June, but do have just over $1 billion in debt repayments due in 2020. But the operations are making decent cash flow, and given they pay off the last of the aircraft that were under the EENs next year, their unencumbered asset base should rise. If they can pull off the labour and supply chain savings of $75 million and $50 million, then it becomes easier. Get the network right and optimise it for cash generation rather than dick measuring, and it'll be a doddle.
I realise that real people are going to lose their jobs here, so I'm not trying to be trite. But Scurrah is right to take the approach he has so that a lot more than 750 people will keep their jobs over the long term, and the public of Australia get a choice of two well-funded airlines to fly on.
I realise that real people are going to lose their jobs here, so I'm not trying to be trite. But Scurrah is right to take the approach he has so that a lot more than 750 people will keep their jobs over the long term, and the public of Australia get a choice of two well-funded airlines to fly on.
Join Date: Apr 2016
Location: Melbourne
Posts: 26
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Yes let’s not forget the boiled lollies before pushback... lol
It is in the best interest of QF to keep Virgin going. The CFO has said so himself. Better to have a competitor that you know and can handle, (happy for them to make money just not so much that effects QF core business) than some new competitor that you don't know.
Wouldn't blame the new bloke as he's only been there 5 mins but in any other serious business this would bring on a massacre level of redundancies and targeted at those that don't contribute or are incompetent. It's gone beyond a joke now. For all it's glorified reputation I'm stunned SQ hasn't pulled the plug - you'd think any other company the storming out the door of it's major shareholder in Air NZ a few years ago would have had the then CEO's head on the chopping block the next day but no, he stayed and continued to be paid bonuses. If it weren't so serious it would be sickening.
No. It's different because QF made substantial profits before and after that... it was a write down with the underlying loss being something like $646M if I recall correctly. Add up all of QF's losses and profits over the last 10 years and it's in positive territory, do the same for Virgin and it's well and truly negative. Also, someone needs to tell the paper it's Virgin Australia Airlines not Virgin 'Airways'.
I doubt that will happen. If Qantas were to be in that position I wouldn't at all be surprised if NZ started a low cost domestic operation or even one of the US carriers.
I do not consider OTP a priority but get into the Gold Coast 10 minutes early and nearly always leave 10 minutes late.
I feel for the 750 staff, not nice to lose your job. A lot of us on here have been there. BUT, I have no doubt there are a LOT of people doing sweet f^&ck all day in and day out. One thing the airline has always been good at, is creating positions for people that do not really make any difference to the operation one bit.
Paul has certainly been given a poisoned chalice. I hope he can come through with the goods.
Why don’t people just see this for what it is?
New CEO joins.
Tanks the profit first year and has large writedowns to clear the decks.
Announces large job cuts but doesn’t disparage the previous management funnily enough.
Moves on some upper level managers to bring his own team in to share the spoils.
Miraculously returns the business to profit and is handsomely rewarded for doing so.
Wash, Rinse, Repeat.
The level of corruption, incompetence and greed amongst Australian corporates is breathtaking and the rest of Australia is too busy working to live to be able to give a ****.
New CEO joins.
Tanks the profit first year and has large writedowns to clear the decks.
Announces large job cuts but doesn’t disparage the previous management funnily enough.
Moves on some upper level managers to bring his own team in to share the spoils.
Miraculously returns the business to profit and is handsomely rewarded for doing so.
Wash, Rinse, Repeat.
The level of corruption, incompetence and greed amongst Australian corporates is breathtaking and the rest of Australia is too busy working to live to be able to give a ****.
You forgot 'charging a small fortune when costs could be kept in-house'....
Spot On What The
Why don’t people just see this for what it is?
New CEO joins.
Tanks the profit first year and has large writedowns to clear the decks.
Announces large job cuts but doesn’t disparage the previous management funnily enough.
Moves on some upper level managers to bring his own team in to share the spoils.
Miraculously returns the business to profit and is handsomely rewarded for doing so.
Wash, Rinse, Repeat.
The level of corruption, incompetence and greed amongst Australian corporates is breathtaking and the rest of Australia is too busy working to live to be able to give a ****.
New CEO joins.
Tanks the profit first year and has large writedowns to clear the decks.
Announces large job cuts but doesn’t disparage the previous management funnily enough.
Moves on some upper level managers to bring his own team in to share the spoils.
Miraculously returns the business to profit and is handsomely rewarded for doing so.
Wash, Rinse, Repeat.
The level of corruption, incompetence and greed amongst Australian corporates is breathtaking and the rest of Australia is too busy working to live to be able to give a ****.
If I were Delta, I'd step in and offer to put the owners out of their misery and offer a low price for the whole outfit. I'd insist it were NOT on a transmission of business basis so that I could throw away anything of no value and just keep the core... Order a bunch of decals for temporary application to the remaining aircraft and then re-employ those I wanted on new conditions. Re-brand the whole thing Delta Australia, keep the colours for cheaper transition and get rid of the archaic reservations system and deploy Delta's IT platform, offshore all the maintenance to the United States to Delta's technical division other than daily maintenance and get rid of every aeroplane that doesn't exist in the parent DL fleet already. LAX would be gone, absorbed into DL, HKG gone, a fleet of 737-800s and get rid of Tiger, just merge any part of value into mainline. Contract out everything except for front line supervision, back office, etc. Load Control as it would presumably now be in the Delta system could be done remotely from Atlanta. Reservations similarly could be done by a combination of res office here and out of hours switched through to the USA (just like QF did with Tulsa and Hammersmith in the 80s and 90s).
I'm no big fan of the Americans as a nation at the moment, but their companies know how to clean a place out and re-set the priorities to making money, particularly in somewhere like Oz where they only have one major competitor.
I'm no big fan of the Americans as a nation at the moment, but their companies know how to clean a place out and re-set the priorities to making money, particularly in somewhere like Oz where they only have one major competitor.
Someone commented that some employees are classified as "specialist". In the Australian context, that seems odd but how odd is it to have a General Manager Customer Journey? Believe it or not, that position exists at Tiger!