Qantas defends Perth-London passenger numbers

PEOPLE were worried this would be one of the most gruelling journeys in the world. Were they right?

IT WAS heralded as a major milestone for Australian aviation — the first non-stop flight linking Australia and the UK over a whopping 17 hours.

When Qantas launched its daily flights between Perth and London in March, the question was: who would be tempted to fly this epic route?

Now, new figures from the British Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), published by the UK’s The Telegraph, has revealed the marathon flights have been taking off with only about 78 per cent of seats filled, prompting Qantas to deny suggestions the route was underperforming.

According to The Telegraph, in April, 10,692 passengers flew in or out of Perth.

Data from the UK aviation body has revealed the number of empty seats on Qantas flights between Perth and London. Picture: Qantas

As the Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft could carry 236 passengers, its monthly capacity was 14,160 seats — meaning that month, capacity reached only 75.5 per cent of the potential maximum.

The figure rose to 76.2 per cent in May and 83.7 per cent in June.

However, the figures only captured passengers flying between Perth and London, and did not take into account passengers using the route to fly between London and Melbourne, or connecting in Sydney and other locations.

In a statement to news.com.au, a Qantas spokesman said: “Our London-Perth route is performing well — it is definitely exceeding our expectations.”

Qantas says the historic route is exceeding its expectation in terms of sales. Picture: Qantas

Qantas’ overall passenger load factor in 2017 was 80.6 per cent, just shy of the global average across all airlines of 81.4 per cent, according to The Telegraph.

While the airline typically didn’t disclose the figures for commercial and competitive reasons, it considered passenger load factor an important metric in assessing the profitability of a route — the more seats filled, the higher the revenue.

But aviation consultant Neil Hansford said he doubted the passenger load average of 78 per cent on the Perth-London route would be a concern for Qantas.

“The golden rule on legacy carriers is 80 (per cent),” he told news.com.au. “Qantas, as a legacy carrier, is already doing better than that.

“So at 78, (Qantas CEO) Alan Joyce wouldn’t be too worried. I would be jumping for joy.”

Mr Hansford said he believed the non-stop service between Australia and the UK was especially popular with passengers flying in premium economy and business class.

“This route is for those who want to get there as quickly as they can on some very new state-of-the-art equipment,” he said.

QF9 prepares to leave Perth for the first ever direct flight to London, in March.

“Many people do want that stopover, especially among those in the leisure class in economy — they’re happy to have their stopover and do their shopping in Singapore.

“The hard thing about this route is changing consumer attitudes and it will be hard to change the attitude of those leisure passengers.

“But in the end this (route) will take premium passengers away from airlines like Singapore Airlines and Etihad.”

Qantas was expected to shed more light on the performance of its historic Perth-London route when it returned its latest financial results next week.

The Perth-London service begins in Melbourne and flies to Perth before it becomes QF9 to London.

The marathon flight was originally scheduled to be about 17 hours but Qantas has already broken speed records twice.

In April, a flight from London to Perth clocked in at just 15 hours and 45 minutes.