Qantas splashes out on IT to help lift performance

The airline has added IT to its list of areas in need of work, as the company navigates its way through ‘operational challenges’.

Qantas executives like Olivia Wirth have been helping out at airports as the airline tries to address operational issues. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Damian Shaw

Qantas has told its biggest customers the airline is spending $15m on IT as part of a range of measures intended to improve its performance.

In a note sent to major corporate and government clients, Qantas acknowledged its operational performance had not been up to standard, with poor punctuality, high cancellation rates and mishandled bags commonplace.

The note went on to list five initiatives being undertaken to overcome the airline’s “well-publicised challenges” including changing the schedule, improving baggage, rostering more people, hiring more staff and better IT.

Schedule changes involved slashing 10 per cent of capacity across Qantas and Jetstar and making more adjustments in Melbourne and Sydney “to build more resilience into our operation”.

Improving baggage focused on recently announced increases to connection times for domestic passengers transferring to international flights, to give baggage handlers time to keep up.

Qantas was also rostering more staff to cover for elevated rates of absenteeism due to sickness, and revealed they had filled 1500 of 2500 vacancies across the airline.

“Our airport partners, particularly in ground handling, are increasing their resourcing as well in what is a tight labour market,” said the note.

Finally Qantas was splashing out $15m on a “major refresh of technology” including new customer kiosks in most domestic hubs “to speed things up”.

Qantas Group chief information officer Sam Charmand said there would also be an update to bag drop technology to complement the new kiosks and gate scanners to increase efficiency for customers when boarding at the gate.

“Since the pandemic we have seen a huge jump in customers choosing to use technology when travelling, which is why we’re investing more in our app and airport technology,” Mr Charmand said.

“These upgrades will also make things easier for our airport teams, who have done a phenomenal job in recent months under challenging circumstance.”

Improvements were also being made to the Qantas app to allow customers to manage more of their booking online, including changing flights after check-in, adding frequent flyer numbers to bookings and requesting classic flight reward upgrades.

At the same time new federal government data showed airfares continued to climb in August, with even the cheapest fares at their highest in close to two-years.

Business class fares were also on the rise again, at 54.5 per cent of the long-term average, after sinking as low as 39.6 per cent in the last 12-months.

The hikes were flagged by Qantas and Rex on the back of soaring fuel prices, with airline executives saying they had no choice but to pass on the increases to passengers.

Airfare data compiled by aviation analytics site OAG comparing 2022 prices with those from 2019, showed some routes had skyrocketed in cost.

The biggest rise was on Sydney to Hervey Bay on Queensland’s Fraser Coast, with one-way fares now averaging $391, up from $108 in 2019.

Sydney-Newcastle flights averaged $368 a ticket, up from $122, and Sydney-Townsville was now priced at $214 one-way, a 56 per cent jump.

Further hikes are expected in coming months as a result of capacity decreases by Qantas, Jetstar and Virgin Australia in response to staffing levels.