CX to stop flying to Kuala Lumpur

[trippin_the_rift]

Hot off the rumour mill:

CX to stop flying HKG/KUL/HKG from March 2017 and KA (Dragon Air) will take over.
This means CX will no longer fly to Malaysia after dropping Penang a while back

 

[kpc]

Hot off the rumour mill:

CX to stop flying HKG/KUL/HKG from March 2017 and KA (Dragon Air) will take over.
This means CX will no longer fly to Malaysia after dropping Penang a while back

Ooh...I have a Cx Hkg-Kul in Feb 17...is KA part of OW ? (thinking of Pier F access)

 

[trippin_the_rift]

Ooh...I have a Cx Hkg-Kul in Feb 17...is KA part of OW ? (thinking of Pier F access)

Yes and the hard product is identical on KA/CX regional so no major issues

 

[Happy Trails]

Ooh...I have a Cx Hkg-Kul in Feb 17...is KA part of OW ? (thinking of Pier F access)

No worries.

https://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en...n/airport/lounges/all-lounges-admittance.html

 

[Foreigner]

Ooh...I have a Cx Hkg-Kul in Feb 17...is KA part of OW ? (thinking of Pier F access)

You'll be okay. Change is taking place in March as per news release:


Dragonair plans four daily Kuala Lumpur flights - The Standard

 

[anat0l]

It almost begs to reason - what is the difference between CX and KA? If the difference is nearly indistinguishable, then what's the big deal in maintaining the brands? Or is there some detail that I've missed?

 

[Welsh-Kiwi]

I'm flying KUL-HKG in January so I should be OK.

 

[serfty]

It almost begs to reason - what is the difference between CX and KA? If the difference is nearly indistinguishable, then what's the big deal in maintaining the brands? Or is there some detail that I've missed?

Probably more to do with costs such as employees pay rates/conditions and other things.

A bit like Jitcinnict and Qantas.

 

[samh004]

Perhaps slowly KA will become the leisure brand, and CX the business brand, similar to JQ/QF respectively.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

It almost begs to reason - what is the difference between CX and KA? If the difference is nearly indistinguishable, then what's the big deal in maintaining the brands? Or is there some detail that I've missed?

Not sure what's exactly happened with the rebranding but KA used to hold (still does?) a separate operating certificate with separate air traffic rights. The two airlines therefore have greater penetration into markets.

 

[Chrizztofa]

It almost begs to reason - what is the difference between CX and KA? If the difference is nearly indistinguishable, then what's the big deal in maintaining the brands? Or is there some detail that I've missed?

I've heard that CX has an industrial dispute with its pilots which is preventing training of new pilots. By shifting routes to KA they can redeploy the CX pilots onto new routes to facilitate expansion. It makes sense to switch KUL since it has limited full-service competition - MH is only running 737s on the route nowadays with a similar hard product to CX/KA.

Further to the above I believe KA has a much better brand recognition in the Chinese market, which goes back to the days when CX did not have rights to fly to China. Even today KA flies to 20+ destinations in China while CX only flies to PEK and PVG. I don't know how much of this brand recognition will be diluted by the rebranding to Cathay Dragon later this year though.

 

[yohy?!]

I've heard that CX has an industrial dispute with its pilots which is preventing training of new pilots. By shifting routes to KA they can redeploy the CX pilots onto new routes to facilitate expansion. It makes sense to switch KUL since it has limited full-service competition - MH is only running 737s on the route nowadays with a similar hard product to CX/KA.

Further to the above I believe KA has a much better brand recognition in the Chinese market, which goes back to the days when CX did not have rights to fly to China. Even today KA flies to 20+ destinations in China while CX only flies to PEK and PVG. I don't know how much of this brand recognition will be diluted by the rebranding to Cathay Dragon later this year though.

Yep, this is the latest in a saga of many years to bust the main CX pilots union - CX is transferring aircraft to KA along with inexperienced 2nd officers on local contracts to gain experience.

2nd officer positions were created a few years back to hire local pilots on very low salaries to put downward pressure on pilot salaries, it remains to be seen if this will succeed given that most have no flying experience and there continues to be a global shortage of pilots.

It's likely that industrial action (which has been ongoing for many months now) will continue into the future while CX management continues to undermine pay & conditions for existing pilots. CX tried this previously in it's cargo operation and it failed when the pilots union refused to provide training or checking to the new cargo crews, the entire operation was absorbed back into CX's main cargo business on the same conditions.