Will COVID-19 kill off the business trip?
Australia used to have some of the busiest air routes in the world, thanks to business travellers. But will the work trip bounce back in 2021? Industry insiders say there are many challenges.
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Tighter company travel policies, the rise of videoconferencing and Virgin Australia’s uncertain future are all expected to damage – but not destroy – Australia’s business travel sector in 2021.
Business day trippers hopping between Melbourne and Sydney helped make that air route the second busiest in the world in 2019, with a total of 54,102 flights, according to global travel data provider OAG.
The Sydney-Brisbane leg was the world’s 12th busiest route, with 33,443 services.
(The world’s busiest domestic route, with nearly 80,000 flights per year, was between Jeju and Seoul Gimpo in South Korea.)
Prior to the coronavirus crisis, Virgin Australia held 30 per cent of Australia’s business travel market but Qantas held a stranglehold on the category, with Roy Morgan research data from January showing customer satisfaction ratings of 83 per cent.
The increasing use of online meeting apps such as Zoom while people work from home has prompted speculation that video conferencing will kill off business travel.
Australian Tourism Industry Council executive director Simon Westaway said videoconferencing would have an impact, but about the death of the sector he was sceptical. He likened such speculation to the many predictions of the death of newspapers: persistent, but also consistently wrong.
“At the end of the day people are social beings, and to transact business it does require a level of social interaction,” he said.
“Longer term, if people are doing business or doing a deal or needing to engage, you can get a hell of a lot done (in person). For all the ease of doing stuff through your computer, there is also a level of frustration around it. You’re not really seeing the colour of people’s eyes.”
The bigger issue affecting the sector, he said, will be “businesses being reluctant to put their people on planes too quickly, in case of fear of an outbreak or some sort of health issue, or a disrupted service”.
Mr Westaway said that it was important to note that while business travel was important, it wasn’t the sole backbone for any Australian airline.
“You’ve got to keep in mind that still one in two customers on a Qantas flight were flying for a leisure purpose,” he said.
“For all the view of balding men with large tummies and suits on planes, the reality is (Qantas) were Australia’s largest leisure airline, so it's a bit of a misnomer.”
Originally published as Will COVID-19 kill off the business trip?
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