British staff replace Australians on Qantas

[NM]

From news.com.au:

THE flying kangaroo has developed an English accent on Qantas flights in and out of London as British flight attendants replace Australians.

The Spirit of Australia's trademark "g'day" started to go missing between London and the airline's Asian hubs of Singapore, Bangkok and Hong Kong after Qantas set up a cabin crew base in Britain's capital in 2005, reports The Australian.

 

[docjames]

Uh, is this news?


Welcome to 2005. Not sure what the point of this article is - slow news day.

 

[NM]

Uh, is this news?


Welcome to 2005. Not sure what the point of this article is - slow news day.

Given the headline of "Qantas becoming un-Australian", I assume someone is pushing an agenda and using the media for delivery.

While the London base was opened in 2005, this article is highlighting that since then there has been a steady decline in Aussie staff being based at the London base. When it opened, many Aussies moved to London for the opportunity to work for Qantas while living in what they expected to be a "glamorous" location. Since then many have either returned to Australia or found other jobs and the replacement staff have been mostly non-Aussies (I guess the term could be un-Australian when referring to employees from other countries??).

Slow news day indeed.

 

[Keith009]

Uh, is this news?


Welcome to 2005. Not sure what the point of this article is - slow news day.

When the UK base opened, most of the spots were meant to be filled by Australians. Usually short haul FAs who want to give long haul a go. The ones I spoke to often tell me about how exciting it was to get to live in London. I also know one CSM who transferred his contract to London despite being paid much less, for the 'certainty' and 'peace of mind' as he now only operates to SIN/BKK/HKG.

Nowadays you'd be hard pressed to find an Aussie FA on those flights other than the CSM and CSS.

There are also a fair few continental Europeans onboard those flights. Had a hysterical Spanish CSM once....

Has anyone been served by Thai crew on QF btw? I've yet to fly QF1/2 but on some other flights like the HKG-MEL portion of QF29/30 I was told there are some BKK-based crew onboard. Didn't get around to asking whether they're actually Thai or Aussies living in BKK.

I suppose QF could argue that they're more Australian than ever as they now reflect the cosmopolitan nature of Australia.

 

[Evan]

I would argue that the British staff have a similar attitude and way of doing things as Australians and make good crew, actually in my expereince i have found the UK crew to be even better.

 

[Reggie]

I would argue that the British staff have a similar attitude and way of doing things as Australians and make good crew, actually in my expereince i have found the UK crew to be even better.

I would agree with this, IMO the UK based staff are more pleasant and provide better service than the Aust based staff.

 

[Keith009]

I would agree with this, IMO the UK based staff are more pleasant and provide better service than the Aust based staff.

Apparently the ones who transferred over to London were selected by a rather competitive process, so that could be part of the reason why the UK staff are generally regarded as the better crew base.

Personally I've found the UK staff most excellent in JCL, on par if not better than the Australian base.

However in FCL, I found the young UK based crew to be a little wet around the ears, seemed to tip toe around pax somewhat, and generally weren't as personable as the more experienced Aussie staff who took over at HKG.