Qantas will spend $80 million to make a slew of customer improvements that new chief executive Vanessa Hudson has ordered in a bid to win back passenger trust in the reputation-hit Australian flag carrier.
Hudson is tapping the airline’s profits to fund the changes, which are all designed to address what Qantas described as customer ‘pain points’.
Some of the headline projects that the money will be used to fund include hiring more call centre staff, making more frequent flyer seats available, and giving frontline staff more flexibility to help customers when things go wrong.
The money will also be spent on improving the quality of inflight food, as well as a review of customer service policies.
Last week, Hudson took to social media to share an awkward video in which she apologised to ‘frustrated’ customers and admitted that Qantas had let passengers down and had often been difficult to deal with.
“We understand why you are frustrated and why some of you have lost trust in us,” Hudson said in the short video message. “I want you to know that we’re determined to fix it, to improve the experience for you and to support our people better,” the embattled CEO continued.
In a trading update released on Monday, Qantas did, however, warn that it might need to increase ticket prices due to rising oil prices. The airline said it would ‘absorb’ the rising costs for the time being but could pass the additional costs onto consumers if oil prices don’t soon fall.
