Hailed and criticized – Alan Joyce leaves Qantas early

Forgotten seems how he steered Qantas through the pandemic, how the airline returned to profitability under his leadership, and how he forged new initiatives like Project Sunrise and airline alliances. For a few weeks, Qantas CEO Alan Joyce has been in the center of the storm. Today, he decided in the interest of the company, to retire two months earlier than planned. It’s not even two weeks since Qantas reported its first profit since 2019 and Alan Joyce was commended for the $2.5 billion pre-tax profit for financial year 2023. The positive news was over exactly one week later when the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) announced it would launch legal action against Qantas in the Federal Court. Qantas allegedly engaged in false, misleading or deceptive conduct, as it had tried to sell tickets for over 8.000 flights between May and July 2022 that had been canceled and removed from sale. According to ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb, Qantas continued to sell tickets for some seventy percent of the canceled flights and failed to notify customers that their flights had been canceled. “The ACCC has conducted a detailed investigation into Qantas’ flight cancellation practices. As a result, we have commenced these proceedings alleging that Qantas continued selling tickets for thousands of canceled flights, likely affecting the travel plans of tens of thousands of people,” Cass-Gottlieb said on August 31 in a media statement. The commission notes that “the ACCC has investigated various aspects of Qantas’ conduct over the past three years. (…) The ACCC continues to receive more complaints about Qantas than about any other business. Last year alone the ACCC received more than 1,300 complaints about Qantas cancellations, accounting for half of all complaints about Qantas reported to the ACCC.” Qantas apologizes Qantas responded first by saying it takes the allegations seriously but released a more detailed comment this Monday: “Qantas continues to review the allegations made by the ACCC and will have more to say once we’ve had that opportunity. Understandably, these allegations have caused significant concern among our customers, our people and the general community. We want to address those allegations as best we can without cutting across the legal process we are now involved in, which follows an ACCC investigation with which we fully co-operated.” Alan Joyce in the cockpit of a Boeing 787-9 in August 2019, when he shared details about the upcoming Project Sunrise test flights. (Qantas) The airline added that the period examined by the ACCC between May and July 2022 was a time of unprecedented upheaval for the entire airline industry. “Qantas struggled to restart post-COVID. We openly acknowledge that our service standards fell well short and we sincerely apologize. We have worked hard to fix them since and that work continues.” Grilled in Parliament On August 28, Joyce was grilled during a hearing of the Senate Committee, which summoned him to explain Qantas’ role in affecting the cost of living of Australian consumers. Initially, Joyce had refused to appear, but he was summoned on the same day that he announced the FY23 results. Joyce faced accusations of misconduct, anti-competitive behavior and lobbying, about his $2.3 million salary, and about putting the credibility and reputation of Qantas at risk by failing to solve operational issues at Sydney Airport. In what Australian media reports described as an “explosive exchange” between Joyce and Labor Senator Sheldon, Joyce often refused to answer questions or stated that Sheldon was making incorrect claims. He left questions unanswered about alleged active lobbying with Australian Prime Minister Albanese to keep the door shut to Qatar Airways’ attempts to get additional slots in Australia. The airline’s failure to repay $470 million in travel credits to customers that had been unused since the pandemic caused another heated public debate. On August 31, Qantas said it would remove the original expiry date for the credits of December 31, adding that customers can either request a cash refund or, in the case of subsidiary Jetstar, use vouchers indefinitely. Joyce got mixed up in another round of public criticism, when reports emerged that he would receive a $24 million payout in cash and shares when he would retire in November, on top of his basic salary. Early retirement Today, Qantas and Joyce responded with his decision to retire earlier than planned, a plan that was announced in May and planned for November. This will see his successor Vanessa Hudson take over on Wednesday, although her succession is still subject to shareholder approval in November. Without addressing any of the accusations that caused the recent whirlwind around him, Joyce said in a media statement: “In the last few weeks, the focus on Qantas and events of the past make it clear to me that the company needs to move ahead with its renewal as a priority. The best thing I can do under these circumstances is to bring forward my retirement and hand it over to Vanessa and the new management team now, knowing they will do an excellent job.” It marks the end of an era at Qantas, the airline Joyce joined from Ansett Australia in 2000. He took the helm of Jetstar Australia in 2003 but became Qantas CEO five years later in 2008. Under his leadership, Qantas entered a deep restructuring in 2011 that resulted in a deep conflict with the staff and unions over salaries and outsourcing of jobs overseas. Joyce took the unusual step of grounding the airline’s entire operations in an attempt to solve the dispute, which eventually happened but not without impacting relationships for some time. The partnership between Qantas and Emirates that was announced in March 2013 is one of the accomplishments of Alan Joyce. (Trent Lidstone) Together with Sir Tim Clark, Joyce has also been the force behind the extensive partnership with Emirates that was announced in March 2013 with a dramatic flypast over Sydney of two Airbus A380s in very close formation. The partnership saw Qantas drop the traditional ‘Kangaroo route’ via Singapore in favor of a shortcut via Dubai, although the Singapore service was reinstated again after five years and preferred over Dubai. Project Sunrise More recently, Qantas launched ultra-long-range flights between Perth and London that laid the foundation for Project Sunrise. This will see non-stop services to London and New York from Melbourne and Sydney in late 2025/early 2026 and should produce some $400 million in incremental profits to Qantas by FY30. Joyce also led Qantas through various fleet renewal projects, which included the introduction of the Airbus A380 and Boeing 787-9, and saw it place orders for the A220 and A321XLR. Last month, Qantas selected more A350-1000s as the future replacement of the A380 and the 787-10 and 787-9 as that of the A330. “There is a lot I am proud of over my 22 years at Qantas, including the past 15 years as CEO,” Joyce said in his statement. “There have been many ups and downs, and there is clearly much work still to be done, especially to make sure we always deliver for our customers. But I leave knowing that the company is fundamentally strong and has a bright future.” Qantas Chairman Richard Goyder thanked Joyce: “Alan has always had the best interests of Qantas front and center, and today shows that. On behalf of the Board, we sincerely thank him for his leadership through some enormous challenges and for thinking well ahead on opportunities like ultra-long-haul travel. This transition comes at what is obviously a challenging time for Qantas and its people. We have an important job to do in restoring the public’s confidence in the kind of company we are, and that’s what the Board is focused on, and what the management under Vanessa’s leadership will do.” Not everyone has been so complimentary to Joyce. The Transport Workers Union (TWU) national secretary Michael Kaine welcomed the announcement and called it "the first good decision the Qantas board has made for a very long time." The Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA) referred to Joyce’s early departure as a “circuit breaker” and noted that a lot of work needs to be done to rebuild Qantas into a trusted brand once again.

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