1500 Flight Centre jobs to go as low demand smashes travel giant

Up to 1500 staff will be offered redundancies as a significant hit to revenue continues to decimate the Queensland travel giant.

QUEENSLAND travel giant Flight Centre will shed up to 1500 sales and support jobs as low demand for travel continues to cripple the company.

The Courier-Mail understands a number of Queensland Flight Centre staff have been handed redundancies within the past few days as part of a major and ongoing process to lower company costs.

A spokesman for the travel giant confirmed about 70 per cent of the 10,000 strong workforce had been stood down or had their roles made redundant during COVID-19 as Flight Centre aims to lower its costs to $65 million each month.

“Sadly, this is the case throughout the travel and tourism industries, with thousands of jobs already lost and, based on research released today by the Tourism and Transport Forum, tens of thousands of additional jobs at risk if the JobKeeper program is not extended,” he said.

“Within our business, up to 1500 sales and support roles may become redundant in Australia once we make an assessment of the remaining limited work to perform and undertake our consultation process.

“Our hearts go out to those people who are affected.”

Flight Centre shares have bounced 6 per cent today to trade at $14.03 – well below a high of $44 in September.

In April company founder and Managing Director Graham ‘Skroo’ Turner told The Courier-Mail Flight Centre could operate for up to 18 months using its existing cash reserves.

The spokesman said the company was working to save as many jobs as possible, or help redundant staff to find new work.

He said the JobKeeper program was appreciated, but acknowledged it “does not offset the almost total loss of revenue brought about by the never-before-seen border and travel restrictions that governments have applied”.

Flight Centre has recorded an increase in domestic bookings, however half of its business, international bookings, remain stagnant with no end in sight.

Originally published as 1500 Flight Centre jobs to go as low demand smashes travel giant