Former Qantas CEO Alan Joyce has been gone three years, but he’s back dredging up and making excuses for all his passenger-unfriendly missteps in a new book ‘sorry, not sorry’ offering mea culpas that really serve as justification for stealing customer money and breaking employment law all in service of the corporate purse.
Joyce says Qantas made mistakes coming out of the pandemic. He regrets blaming passengers for airport chaos. He would handle flight credits and “ghost flights” differently. He wishes the airline had not illegally outsourced 1,820 ground workers. And he says personally selling A$17 million of Qantas stock knowing regulators were about to sue the airline is a decision he would change with hindsight.
But each concession comes with a justification. COVID was unprecedented. Qantas was weeks from running out of cash (he lobbied the government against broad bailouts, hoping to drive competitor Virgin Australia into insolvency). Decisions were made in good faith, there were other airlines who handled credits and refunds even more abusively (Cf. United, JetBlue, Lufthansa). And, most importantly, Qantas survived because he ruthlessly “got more things right than we got wrong.”
That’s not an apology, it’s a surreal defense. Ethics and laws aren’t things to observe only when you have margins fat enough that they aren’t inconvenient. And if you have to resort to stealing from customers, your business shouldn’t survive.
Joyce Says He’s Sort Of Sorry
Joyce’s memoir, Riding the Jet Stream, and his accompanying media tour are an effort to reclaim his legacy. He led Qantas for nearly 15 years, built Jetstar, and cut costs, becoming one of Australia’s highest-paid executives. But the airline’s reputation collapsed under his leadership and he was forced out ahead of his own schedule.
The end of his tenure was the worst. Qantas came out of the pandemic with cancelled flights, lost bags, decimated call centers and angry customers. Joyce blamed the customers, saying travel frustrations were because they were no longer “match fit” for airport security.
He admits that remark was “insensitive and stupid” and says he is sorry. During the pandemic, then American Airlines CEO and now Qantas board member Doug Parker described his own airline’s customers as “somewhat different from our normal clientele.”
Joyce treats that comment as though it were his principal failure. The comment mattered because it revealed his instinct: when the airline dismantles its capacity, dismisses experienced staff and couldn’t operate reliably, he blamed the passengers. And throughout the book he uses circumstances to blame his own failures, and he was the one being paid tens of millions of dollars to manage through them.
Qantas Really Did Steal Customer Money
Instead of honoring refunds for cancelled flights and significant schedule changes (as required by law, and the airlines own terms), Qantas made refunds difficult and misled passengers to believe their only choice was flight credits. They agreed to a A$105 million settlement this year, notifying customers who received credits for cancelled flights that they are entitled to refunds for money the airline kept years-earlier.
Separately, the airline sold flights it knew it would never operate. Joyce says they didn’t do it on purpose. Schedules changed constantly during Covid. But they admitted that it misled consumers by offering tickets on tens of thousands of flights it had already decided to cancel and by failing to tell existing customers when their flights were cancelled.
That wasn’t just at the beginning of the pandemic. It continued through August 2023 for flights scheduled as late as May 2024. And the airline admitted that senior managers knew cancelled flights were not being removed from the schedule even as they continued to sell the flights. This only benefited the airline.
- It collected money from customers who might have chosen another flight or airline.
- It retained customers who became less likely to switch airlines when they learned closer to departure that the flights were cancelled.
- And they didn’t spend the money on system updates.
Joyce isn’t lying when he says there was never a corporate meeting where they settled on a plan to sell imaginary flights, but that this was the effect underscores the priorities of the airline under his leadership. He justifies it saying that other airlines did things that were worse.
Illegal Layoffs
Australian labor law is insane. But those are the rules they operate under, what their competitors live with, and the context in which they make money. And the airline illegally outsourced 1,820 baggage handlers, cleaners and other ground workers during the pandemic.
Joyce admits his workers were illegally dismissed, in retrospect he should have made a different decision, but he spent years fighting that conclusion in the courts all the way to the High Court before eventually agreeing to A$120 million in worker compensation and receiving a record A$90 million penalty. The decision cost the airline more than A$200 million, so CEO Joyce would definitely do things differently because it worked out badly for the Qantas bottom line.
Federal Court Justice Michael Lee described Qantas’s “performative remorse” over the issue, and said they were “the wrong kind of sorry.” That’s also a perfect description for Joyce’s current book tour. He says this all felt like cutting off his own arm, when it was the workers who actually lost something.
He Sold His Stock In Advance Of The Fines And Settlements
In June 2023 Joyce sold about A$17 million of Qantas shares. Weeks later, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission investigation into cancelled flights became public, and the airline’s legal, political and reputational problems drove down its share price. Joyce says the sale is another decision he would change with hindsight.
The board later reduced Joyce’s FY2023 compensation by A$9.26 million, including forfeiting A$8.36 million in stock. Qantas said events under his leadership caused “considerable harm” to its relationships with customers, employees and other stakeholders. This was presented as accountability, though Joyce had earned well over A$100 million at the airline and later received another long-term incentive payout as Qantas shares recovered.
Retiring two months earlier than planned, publishing a memoir and saying he would choose a better date to sell shares is something I guess.
Joyce’s Tenure Was Terrible For Customers
Joyce lobbied for protectionism, and gave special treatment to lawmakers and their families, keeping fares higher and limiting customer choices. Blocking the expansion of flights into Australia by Qatar Airways was the perfect example. His deferring replacement aircraft to such an extent that Qantas’s own chairman last year conceded the fleet “should have been replaced earlier” and identified it as the reason for poor cabin conditions, mechanical problems and cascading disruptions.
Qantas Frequent Flyer cut points-earning, eliminated business and first class any seat awards, jacked up surcharges on Emirates redemptions, increased premium award prices just before the pandemic and reduced the value of Points Plus Pay.
Alan Joyce’s parting gift to customers? Three and a half months before departing the airline, he added former American Airlines CEO Doug Parker to the board. It hardly surprises we’ve seen cabin densification plans developed in the years since.
We’re supposed to feel badly for Joyce because the accumulated stress of running Qantas, including through Covid, was rough. But he was the CEO. And he became very wealthy in the role. No one forced him to do it. Giving him credit for every good outcome, and accepting excuses for every failure isn’t even leadership.
During Joyce’s tenure, Qantas achieved an annualized return of 7.5% assuming full reinvestment of distributions. That compares to 8.6% for the Australian Stock Exchange 200 as a whole, and 13.9% for the S&P 500.
$10,000 invested in Qantas at the beginning of Joyce’s tenure would have been worth $29,100 at the end – or $68,000 if it had been invested in the broad U.S. index. In other words, Joyce wasn’t just bad for customers, he wasn’t great delivering value for shareholders either.
Crikey! Australia is one of the few places in the “developed” world that manages to be worse than the US for air passenger protections. Unlike the EU/UK 261 or Canada APPR, there’s no statutory protections there. But, even compared to the US (where DOT rules mandate a prompt cash refund to original payment if a flight is canceled/significantly altered and you decline rebooking) Australia has no automatic rule.
Down Under, you’re left relying on Australian Consumer Law. On paper, ACL guarantees override whatever ‘fine print’ airlines try to hide in their contracts of carriage. The trap? ACL is a nightmare to enforce on-the-spot when you’re stranded at the gate. It took years of court battles to force Qantas to shell out A$105M for their “ghost flight” shenanigans, which does zero good for a passenger stuck at Sydney Airport at 10 PM.
Fortunately, the post-pandemic Qantas fallout pushed Canberra to start to care (but it’s still taking time). Their Parliament is proceeding with an Aviation Consumer Protection Bill to establish an Aviation Consumer Ombudsperson and a binding ‘Charter of Rights.’ Until those protections hit the tarmac, didgeri-don’t expect an automatic refund without a fight.
@1990
What? No rant about corporations, CEO’s compensation disgusting, bad, protections not in place? Damn, I made a fresh batch of popcorn and opened a beer awaiting the 2 page diatribe. Well, in this case, the guy is clearly a POS, but I expected much more out of good ole 1990…. I’m disappointed and my popcorn is getting cold…
We all know I don’t want to call Joyce a latrine weasel , but I’ll allow everyone to substitute the correct definition of what he is and what he did.
This is an excellent example of leadership. Other CEOs should take note.
@D Fray — Oh, if you wish. Some say, I’m a one-trick pony… ‘let’s do it, ride it, my pony… my saddle’s waiting, come and jump on it…’ But, I was just skipping ahead to answer (sensible regulations, consumer protections, air passenger rights legislation, which are far more ‘exciting,’ if you ask me.)
For those with access to the ABC’s iView (Australia), if Optics is still on, watch it. It’s just six episodes about a PR firm, but one of them has the firm representing an airline. The bit about justifying selling tickets on ghost flights that the airline’s PR person does is comedic parody done wonderfully.
Qantas was literally weeks away from running out of cash and having to stop flying. That may not fit within your AI-derived narrative and general hate piece, but that is the fact. So reframing the decisions made by the airline attempting to reinvent itself after Covid, needs the context. Also other airlines in the region such as Virgin Australia, not only didn’t refund their flight credits, but have recently absorbed them back onto their P&L for their Executive paypackets. Air New Zealand was just as bad (which received no media). As a QF customer throughout that period, both before and after, Qantas remains one of the best (and most profitable) airlines globablly. They have shareholders and have to make money – but anyone can run an airline right?
@Lasloy — I do actually like Qantas as a passenger. But, we’re not talking about a 2-hour flight from SYD-ADL. Gary was discussing some pretty egregious practices by one of the former leaders of the airline, and how the industry should learn from those mistakes, not sane-wash or repeat them.
Also, the pandemic era was a one-off ‘black-swan’ event, in many cases leading to governments stepping in to provide loans and grants to essential businesses, including airlines; however, passengers who didn’t get to fly because the airline was not operating at the time, should not have been the ones to take on the financial burdens of that mess.
Keep in mind, currently, fuel shortages and price shocks appear to be be the next major incident, and neither Australia nor New Zealand really has little to do with the cause (Iran war), but airlines around the world will be impacted. So, will QF start charging extra for flights already booked and paid before the war started? If so, such a surcharge would seem absurd. Just saying, if folks like Joyce had their way, it seems he’d be shaking people down as they board (“empty your wallets, mate!”)
@1990 that is simply not true. The aviation industry goes through black swan events every 15-20 years. Remember SARS? Remember 9-11 when Ansett went belly up? Even the Gulf war in 1991 saw seven carriers go belly up in the US alone. The aviation industry is a very fragile beast – and very few of them make a decent return on capital. And Gary’s assessment was a clumsy attempt to smear a hard working CEO who, despite (admitted) mistakes – provided the airline with the profitable underpinings it continues to enjoy today.
@Lasloy — You conflate crisis management with taking customer money for flights they’ve already decided to cancel (‘ghost flights’). That wasn’t a unavoidable consequence of the pandemic; it was an intentional cash-preservation strategy that exploited the lack of passenger rights in Australia. Capital risk is supposed to belong to shareholders and high-paid executives, not everyday passengers who are unknowingly providing zero-interest loans to keep these balance sheets afloat. “Other airlines were terrible too” is not a good strategy, either. Passengers should be celebrating Canberra’s decision to finally end self-regulation.
Ultimately 261 type compensation just eats at the bottom line. If airlines provide x amount of return then they can provide 261 but it just means higher fares I guess. Take ten flights without compensation at x per flight or ten with and pay x +26 euros. Just a lottery. Basically the airlines providing some sort of insurance. No net greater gain to the consumer.
Qantas is a dud for frequent fliers but unfort 99% of Aussies are beholden to them even though it’s way easier to access them using American miles or alternatively using virgin velocity points which I find are far more useful with way less fees to access tpac and flights to Asia on United and ANA.
Airlines in the USA and Australia (etc) could charge you a base fare and say tick the box and pay x dollars and we’ll give you 261 euros if the flight was delayed. In Europe it’s just mandatory to pay the higher fare.
@Mick — If airlines want to avoid those payments, they just need to operate reliably (like, properly maintain aircraft, and adequately staff; they don’t pay when it’s weather or other events outside their control). 261-type regulations haven’t prevented British or European carrier’s ability to make healthy profits. Also, to clarify, the payment is not literally ‘261 euros’… that’s just the name of the law. Payments are actually closer to 200-600 euros depending on duration of delay and distance.
As for the consumers, you could not be more wrong, because those protections are far more than just the compensation when airlines are at-fault; for instance, the duty of care, when applicable, like overnight accommodations, meals, rebookings, etc., is far superior to the nothing in Australia and the next-to-nothing in the US. A baseline of protections are better than hoping corporations ‘do the right thing.’ Gary’s story above is a case-study in why ‘hope’ alone is not enough.
I generally like the article – absolutely correct that Joyce was an overpaid POS whose disgusting behaviour went way before the COVID period.
But – your comment “Australian labor law is insane.” is so very, very wrong. Australian labour law is simply FAIR.
It really is about time that the USA caught up with most of the rest of the ‘western’ world regarding labour entitlements – and their very poor attitude to labour is not a new thing that is simply blameable on the Orange Moron.
^PREACH.
@1990 that’s all fair. I get the range of compensation but feel “261” is a decent enough moniker for the scheme.
Do European airlines have better reliability and less delays now that they are forced to compensate when things go wrong?
@Mick — Yes, overall. EU/UK261 forces airlines to treat operational buffers as risk management rather than wasted cost.
If you compare the three regions, the US wins on routine 15-minute punctuality, but Europe leads on preventing severe 3+ hour delays because EU/UK261 makes extended ground delays brutally expensive. Australia, lacking statutory fines, has historically suffered from higher cancellation rates and softer punctuality.
For passengers, Europe’s model means fewer stranded nights (and immediate duty-of-care coverage like hotels if disruptions occur). For executives and investors, it aligns long-term profits with operational resilience; cutting buffers might temporarily boost short-term margins, but a single major operational failure under 261 wipes those gains out.