Yesterday I wrote about how Rex Airlines is in turmoil, as trading of the company’s shares was halted on Monday, pending a further announcement. There’s now a major update, as Australia’s third largest airline has entered voluntary administration, which has immediate implications for the carrier’s operations.
Continue reading: Rex Airlines Enters Voluntary Administration, Cancels 737 Flights
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
FWIW Adminstration is the US equivalent of Bankruptcy under Australian Law. Admittedly no where near as flexible as US chapter 11 bankruptcy law
I think the 737 operations were started in the expectation that Virgin Australia would not emerge from bankruptcy, so there was more competition with established brands (and FFP products etc) than REX expected.
This is a shame. From all accounts it was really good domestic airline from passenger experience point of view and with great customer service onboard, and remotely. If they could have survived could see them forcing Virgin Australia and Qantas to up their game in this respect
While nowhere big as Rex, another Australian airline, Bonza, already shut down earlier this year.
Rex was nice but it didn’t have the schedule, nor a compelling reason to choose them over Virgin or Qantas or Jetstar. Virgin aggressively priced their flights at $5 less than Rex (and to a degree so did Jetstar).
The Aus govt has already said they would assist the regional network if needed.
The flying public can’t seem to support a third airline. The low cost model does not seem to get a strong foothold in Australia & Canada. Airlines keep trying the low or Ultra low cost model to no avail. It must be due to lower populations in their respective countries or folks like paying more to fly. I would have liked to see both Bonza and Rex make it in Australia and Lynx Air and Swoop in Canada.
Aren’t they partners with DL? I can’t imagine many DL pax flew them, so there might not be major implications for them.
By partnering with Australia's most Premium™ airline, Delta has ensured that its customers connecting onwards to Rex Australia flights will never have to endure a day-of cancellation ever again. This focus on operational perfection, even with its codeshare partners, is why Delta is the most profitable airline in history,
Australia has a problem. It's like US, where the country is geographically large, but their population is so much lower than the US. US has more than 10x their population, which allows it to sustain multiple carriers.
Even Canada has 50% more people than Australia and has a hard time sustaining Air Canada + the various random competitors. Canada also already has the benefit of centralizing its population along the border, but Australia's cities are much more spread out like in the US.
Regardless, it's already very less than ideal to have only one full service longhaul carrier in QF.
There is plenty of competition for Qantas. Travelers to North America can fly United, American, Delta, or Air Canada. Services to Asia are myriad, and can connect pax to Nth America or Europe. The ME 3 all fly here, and do so with multiple daily frequencies from the large population centres.
There had to be at least a few pax connecting from Melbourne and Brisbane in Sydney. I don't know why you'd bother, though - if you're obliged to use a US carrier, you'd just book one of the nonstops on United to avoid the PITA transfer at Sydney.
Rex wasn't a dedicated LCC, though - they had a business class cabin up the front, and positioned themselves as direct rivals to Virgin AU. What they couldn't do, though, was match VAs service frequency. One nonstop in the morning & evening in each direction between Melbourne and Brisbane, for instance, was never going to cut it with high-yield business traffic. Their attempt at Melbourne-Perth offered only one return from the west - a red-eye. Ain't nobody got time for that.
This is correct. Interestingly they always did very well when they were a regional carrier, with strong brand recognition and intense customer loyalty. Hopefully they'll dump the 737s and get back to their roots/routes.
And in an even more of a twist, Virgin are accommodating affected travelers.
https://x.com/RexAirlines/status/1818271607909179562?s=19
Atleast it seems the regional flights are safe.
And Virgin will potentially even taken back some planes from Rex to bolster their fleet.
It all seemed to positive for Rex when Virgin was on the brink...
It is sad that another airline in Australia has folded.
There however a few other regional airlines. Some have been around for years and some are new.
Air North has been around for years and primarily services the top end of Australia (eg Darwin, Groote Eylandt. Kununarra).
Nexus Airlines is a new airline and services the Geraldton-Karratha-Port Hedland-Broome (ie mostly FIFO workers).
Then there is Alliance airlines which is based in Brisbane but serves a lot of the inland regional areas such as Mt Isa, Newman and Emerald.
I have also taken some less well known charter airlines such as Air Frontier or Chartair (and no it is not luxury travel).
If you look at international market share, Qantas is still the de facto number 1.
Local carriers will always be more relevant because it's not about singular routes or just having service to North America, but the entirety of it. Flying domestically, but then also flying from Australia to the US, Asia, Europe, etc.
The US gets ME3 carriers and other foreign airlines, but Delta/United/AA still all meaningfully provide the most service and networks within the US and to the major cities across the world. Qantas is the only one that can do that for Australia right now. Qantas in Australia is very similar to how Air Canada dominates in Canada.
Australia simply doesn't have the population while also being too geographically large to sustain another full service carrier to meaningfully compete with Qantas. When VA was doing longhaul to the US, they had been bleeding money despite having a JV w/ Delta back in the day,
There are abundant interline agreements that make domestic connections a breeze. The main issue is that many Australians are hopelessly ensnared in the Qantas loyalty program.
The issue with Rex 737 I believe is because they are flying old VA planes same VA routes but more expensive than VA or QF.
It will be a real shame if Rex can no longer service its regional customers.
We can fly to Sydney in 45 minutes on Rex as opposed to six hours on the one bus a day!
Our local council has just spent a lot of money upgrading our small airport as well.
Our local hospitals rely on a lot of fly in fly out doctors, particularly at weekends. Will they still want to come if they have to drive?