Qantas boss to outline big international shake-up

[Andrew P]

likely find FRA has an X against it on your ticket, so cant stopeover so any bags must be tagged thru to Moscow, also as nonshow the rest ofthe inteniary will be cancelled

[Lee G]

http://www.smh.com.au/business/gulf-...814-1it1q.html

This is just what everyone wants ... they'd rather a gulf carrier than our own.

[Dave Dale]

Maybe it's what Qantas has done for all of us, allowed a gulf carrier to become our own.

[Ash W]

It's the classic catch 22 for Qantas. Qantas cannot hope to compete on price with these carriers owing to their government subsidies and lower tax rates. Qantas cannot hope to compete on route options owing to the fact that Qantas is based in Australia which is in the middle of the least populated (and one of the poorest) corners or the the world and the gulf carriers 1 hope from Australia and 1 hop from the rest of the rest of the world. So all Qantas is left to compete with is product and service, which as we all know costs money, especially with the rising cost of living and the higher wage expectations of Australians in general to pay for the cost of living, thus making it even harder to compete on price. So it all goes around in circles.

So I would say the market has driven this. About the only thing Qantas could and or should have done is formed a closer alliance with one of the major gulf carriers or worked closer with Royal Jordanian. Ie if you cannot beat em join em. Just like Virgin Aust has done with Ethiad.

[lloyd fox]

Emirates offered QF a code share from day 1 and they knocked it back.

Another great decision by Qantas.

[Ash W]

You are speaking with hindsite of course. The market when Emirates came to Australia was completly different. For starters Dubai was not non stop as it is today and the amount of onwards destinations (which is irrelivant if the code share didn't include access to these) they had on offer again no where near what it is today.

So yes it is easy to criticise in 2011, but ask the question what would Qantas have got out of the deal back in the mid 90's, when Emirates only carried a bit over 3m passengers, compared to the 31m+ they carry today.

[Andrew Johnson]

Originally Posted by Ash W

It's the classic catch 22 for Qantas. Qantas cannot hope to compete on price with these carriers owing to their government subsidies and lower tax rates. Qantas cannot hope to compete on route options owing to the fact that Qantas is based in Australia which is in the middle of the least populated (and one of the poorest) corners or the the world and the gulf carriers 1 hope from Australia and 1 hop from the rest of the rest of the world. So all Qantas is left to compete with is product and service, which as we all know costs money, especially with the rising cost of living and the higher wage expectations of Australians in general to pay for the cost of living, thus making it even harder to compete on price. So it all goes around in circles.

So I would say the market has driven this. About the only thing Qantas could and or should have done is formed a closer alliance with one of the major gulf carriers or worked closer with Royal Jordanian. Ie if you cannot beat em join em. Just like Virgin Aust has done with Ethiad.

Qantas can employ Thai flight attendants very cheaply. Think I read that the Thai Jetstar flight attendants who got sacked recently in SYD for saying they were tired, were on something like AUD$258/month retainer + AUD$7/hour, which in Thailand, probably means you can live like a king, but is probably 1/10 of what Australian based QF flight attendants are on.

Qantas has no choice, it must lower labour costs as it's competing in a global market.

[lloyd fox]

Ash well obviously Qantas didn't have any hindsight, or they would have done the deal.They would have been told by EK their future plans which blind freddie would have known and understood that non stops were on the plans.

Why defend them they have made plenty of mistakes and this is one big one.

To stick with BA and then have to backtrack all over Europe or go with EK and hub out of DXB one stop to heaps of European destinations .Tell me which is the no brainer.

At least VA have the sense to go with EY ..Oh don't tell me that VA aren't aware of EY expansion plans.

[Justin L]

I'll throw a curve ball.

Asia
QF have already planned some sort of tie up with MH. This would compete with the VA/SQ network for Asia. They have a joint venture in the works with JL for Jetstar Japan hubbing out of NRT for Japan domestic, China and other NE Asia flights.

North America
AA will work for them in the US through LAX and DFW.

Middle East and Europe
If they let the EK thing slip a few years back, and EY is taken with VA, could they look at a VA/EY style tie-up with QR? QR only service MEL in Australia, and with QF Sydney-centric, they wouldn't take away from their prime SYD routes.

Just my thoughts. Probably unlikely I know, but I think it could be interesting.

[Montague S]

in other words Ash, for the past 15+ years QF has been run by blind imbeciles.