Fully Inflexible - A Rort?

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I would agree that there have been a lot of cancellations recently but from my observations, these have been weather related. I dutifully pay my carbon offset but I doubt this will help in the short term!
Flex fares, even for P1, only help if there are seats available. If I'm serious about wanting options, I book two flex fares and cancel the one I don't need. This converts to a voucher and I use it for my next flight.
 
I noticed that SYD-CBR gets cancelled regularly by QF whilst there were a lot less cancellation by VA. My boss always complained about QF cancelled his flight and move him to later flights.
 
Might be worth looking at an ExpertFlyer subscription... that way you can monitor the fare class availability across flights. If you also find out the actual fare bucket of the Flex fare you are purchasing (through flight details in MMB), you can see if any of the same fare bucket fares are available on flights you wish to move to. (Within Flex, there are sub-fare classes, which generally, for want of a better way to express it, represent different price points within the Flare class.) There's ways to be able to make a seemingly better educated-guess about load-factors on upcoming flights, though unless you have access to the airline's own system, its still a dark art based on heuristics.
 
Have experienced similar issue with flexible fares on Air NZ domestic being unchangeable due to full flights. It means I'm more selective than I used to be as to when to pay the extra for flexibility.
 
Ive always said there is no such thing as a "flexible" ticket. Every ticket can be changed, the only variable is the change cost. And the lesson here is that no matter how flexible your ticket or whatever the change cost, it is still absolutely subject to seat availability. and more often than not seat availability is tight - generally when people want to fly is often the time other people want to fly.
 
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Seems they are just cancelling lightly loaded flights (Complete supposition on my behalf)

The bigger picture has to be considered. Say a MEL-ADL early flight has a low load. That aircraft may then operate ADL-SYD-BNE-PER that day. Cancelling the MEL-ADL leg of the aircraft's itinerary means QF having to re-accommodate potentially 500+ passengers on the day's remaining legs of that itinerary. And then, in this example, the aircraft will not be positioned in PER for the early departure the following day.

Yes QF cancels flights with low loads but the frequency of this is exaggerated many times over by rumour and hearsay.
 
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The bigger picture has to be considered. Say a MEL-ADL early flight has a low load. That aircraft may then operate ADL-SYD-BNE-PER that day. Cancelling the MEL-ADL leg of the aircraft's itinerary means QF having to re-accommodate potentially 500+ passengers on the day's remaining legs of that itinerary. And then, in this example, the aircraft will not be positioned in PER for the early departure the following day.

Yes QF cancels flights with low loads but the frequency of this is exaggerated many times over by rumour and hearsay.

But an aircraft flying MEL-SYD-MEL would be very easy to cancel for 'operational' reasons. They obviously would pick the right 'targets' to cancel...

Even today, it would appear that the QF404/QF419 and QF412/QF423 MEL-SYD-MEL rotations have been mysteriously cancelled. Due to the timings, it cannot be the same aircraft (so two different aircraft would have had to have 'mechanical issues' an hour apart for this to be the cause) and all other MEL-SYD flights have departed on time (the weather cannot be that bad as there are no delays and VA operated all of their MEL-SYD-MEL services on time as well and with no cancellations).

Something fishy here or just a very inconvenient coincidence?

Looking back on previous days, the QF MEL-SYD-MEL schedule is littered with numerous suspicious cancellations (on every day available for review) which cannot all be due to the weather...
 
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Something fishy here or just a very inconvenient coincidence?

Looking back on previous days, the QF MEL-SYD-MEL schedule is littered with numerous suspicious cancellations (on every day available for review) which cannot all be due to the weather...

In many cases it really doesn't matter where on the network the problem is, or what the problem is (technical, crewing issues, whatever), its less disruptive to pull a plane from SYD-MEL and use that wherever you need it. You've got more options on the re-accommodation front.

On the other hand, cancelling, say SYD-AYQ is going to be more disruptive to passengers.
 
I noticed that SYD-CBR gets cancelled regularly by QF whilst there were a lot less cancellation by VA. My boss always complained about QF cancelled his flight and move him to later flights.

Is this to do with the QF dispute with Canberra airport re landing amd parking fees ?


 
Crews also need to be in position to operate further services down the line, not just aircraft.

You need to be very sure of facts before assuming a flight is cancelled ONLY due to loads. Again, these cancels are usually done weeks or even onths in advance rather than on the day of departure. Those are almost certainly MX or WX (weather) related.
 
It looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and both of Quacky's parents were ducks, but there is no way in this 'world' that Quacky is a duck...

There is 'reasonable evidence' that at least some of the many late cancellations on busy East Coast routes are due to 'light loads' or similar 'commercial reasons'.

QF will try to assign another reason for the cancellations, but even if they admitted they were for 'commercial reasons', I assume some would still defend them as 'good business sense'.
 
It looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and both of Quacky's parents were ducks, but there is no way in this 'world' that Quacky is a duck...

There is 'reasonable evidence' that at least some of the many late cancellations on busy East Coast routes are due to 'light loads' or similar 'commercial reasons'.

QF will try to assign another reason for the cancellations, but even if they admitted they were for 'commercial reasons', I assume some would still defend them as 'good business sense'.

Believe it or not, it just does not happen on the day for that reason alone.
 
I am reasonably confident it does happen, just like I am reasonably confident Quacky is a duck....

Pleb, I dont think you could ever be convinced otherwise. Despite any info given by those in the know.

In Life there are those that have a feeling, an idea, an agenda. Those that will not accept any info that does not gel with their underlying desire to wish that an airline is a mongrel. In reality another form of duck. If those people disregard gentle hints from people who have far greater inside knowledge, if they continue their outrage despite having no real knowledge, if they continue to quack like disgruntled ducks, then forgive me, but I tend to form the opinion that they are another of those "ducks". :)
 
Pleb, I dont think you could ever be convinced otherwise. Despite any info given by those in the know.

In Life there are those that have a feeling, an idea, an agenda. Those that will not accept any info that does not gel with their underlying desire to wish that an airline is a mongrel. In reality another form of duck. If those people disregard gentle hints from people who have far greater inside knowledge, if they continue their outrage despite having no real knowledge, if they continue to quack like disgruntled ducks, then forgive me, but I tend to form the opinion that they are another of those "ducks". :)

For interest, who is 'in the know' with inside knowledge?
 
For interest, who is 'in the know' with inside knowledge?
Please be serious. It is very obvious in this forum who speaks from personal ideas vs those that have an involvement in the industry that are not "pax'.
 
Please be serious. It is very obvious in this forum who speaks from personal ideas vs those that have an involvement in the industry that are not "pax'.

Well.... with respect to 'the insiders' detailed knowledge on this issue, we will need to agree to disagree on this one...
 
My suggestion to the OP is to move your business to VA. Fly Ahead is a great benefit for SG and WP, and invariably they will fit you in to an earlier flight at no additional cost.
 
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I would agree to move to VA for the published fly ahead benefit in this respect.

Having said that, I've never had issues changing to earlier flights *if seats available* - but I've been P1 for five years, so that's obviously giving me a big boost - even on non "flex" fares, which the offficial benefit explicitly states, QF do tend to do their best to look after us. I'd note I'd also been successful as a WP, but this was some years back with HLO and asking.. certainly not something I'd expect to be able to do per the published entitlements, but often there is flexibility (or used to be!) with agents, specially if it can free up a seat with a busy peak appproaching they often appreciate the chance to shift pax if it makes sense.

And when weather and such is forecast, then there's often general calls for people who want to move to earlier flights - I've heard that a few times in various lounges.

As for the argument about flights being cancelled only due to low loadings on day of departure. I'm not 100% black or white on the topic myself. I do however believe very strongly that the vast majority of on day cancels are not related to commercial considerations because as noted above aircraft and crews do still need to route to keep their own schedules - it can be a major PITA with flow on effects if one or the other (or both) do not go where they are supposed to eg that MEL-SYD 737 may continue on to CNS or TSV or ADL, and then further from there and it breaks all kinds of things (I often enjoy asking crews what their day schedule looks like to get an idea of the routings - I hope that doesn't sound like I'm a stalker lol). I find such logistics fascinating.

The reality is that only QF operations know the truth and probably only a very few who have or do work in these areas. Almost certainly people in yield and revenue management have zero say over day to day operational issues, while flight and crew scheduling would.

Now, I could see that if there was a decision to do a cancel between say a 1530 and a 1545 MEL-SYD service, both at 50% loading, it may well come down to looking at the routings of aircraft and crew to see downstream ramifications but I doubt it's a regular occurance. As discussed earlier airlines yield manage to avoid low loads, and if they are forecast they proactively cancel/reschedule services onths and weeks out, not on the day. We've all had those equipment downgrade notices, or that a flight has been changed notifications for flights a few months out - annoying, but this is when airlines finalise schedules, rosters all kinds of things.

It's not as simple as pointing at a plane saying it has 20 booked on it out of 156 (or whatever) and saying nope we'll not run that those pax can take the next one. There's so much more involved.

Anyone who knows anything about airline operations, scheduleing (fleet and crew), knows there's so many fators involved it's way more complicated than one sector on one plane.

However, I'm not an industry person, despite knowing several pretty senior folks at a number of US legacy and global carriers for decades, and things like this come up from time to time in discussions. I find it endlessly fascinating. In no way to I claim to know what goes on at QF with the huge cxl rate of QF* CBR flying, or anything in particular relatied to QF operations bar what I read in publications like AA and on forums(and talking to crews).. I do feel I have some practical knowledge of general principles of airline operations.

It would be interesting to hear from someone like jb747 if he'd ever had a sector cancelled he was due to fly for commercial reasons. Almost no chance with long haul international of course, but it would be interesting to know. It also raises a side thought of if a crew are paid by flying hours, and they are required to a certain minimum (or maximum) per month this would be another factor. Often crews are given trip schedules that cover a few days of flying, that may be something like MEL-BNE-TSV-BNE, BNE-ADL-MEL-SYD, SYD-MEL-BNE-MEL and you throw a cancel into that imagine the disruption.....

my 48 cents worth
 
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