October Best & Worst Airlines For On-Time Performance

Australian airlines' on-time arrivals and departures were much lower than the long-term average last month.

Joe Cusmano 4 years ago 2 min read

Qantas and Jetstar Launch Direct Services to Vanuatu

Qantas and Jetstar – Photo: Qantas

The combined on-time arrival and departure rates for Australian domestic airlines in October 2022 were 69.3% and 68.55%, respectively, suggesting a year-over-year drop in the reliability of 20%.

According to the most up-to-date summary of airline on-time performance data from BITRE, the average percentage of on-time arrivals and departures was close to 88% in October 2021.

On-time arrivals

Qantas (74.2%)
QantasLink (74.1%)
Virgin Australia Regional Airlines (73.7%)
Rex Airlines (68.3%)
Virgin Australia (64.5%)
Jetstar (64.4%)

On-time departures

QantasLink (74.5%)
Qantas (73.1%)
Rex (70.5%)
Virgin Australia Regional Airlines (69.2%)
Virgin Australia (63%)
Jetstar (61.6%)

Cancellations

Virgin Australia Regional Airlines (5.1%)
Jetstar (3.9%)
Virgin Australia (3.6%)
QantasLink (3%)
Rex Airlines (2.2%)
Qantas (1.2%)

Rex Airlines, the Virgin Australia network, and Jetstar trailed Qantas in on-time arrivals and departures. At the same time, Qantas and QantasLink topped the charts.

Qantas’ domestic capacity is expected to rise to 100 per cent of pre-pandemic levels by the second half of FY2023. This is good news for the airline.

The monthly rate of cancellations was 5.1% for Virgin Australia Regional Airlines, followed by 3.9% for Jetstar, 3.6% for Virgin Australia, 3.0% for QantasLink, 2.2% for Rex Airlines, and 1.2% for Qantas overall.

After launching their “Bring on Wonderful” brand campaign last month to rethink the customer experience, this is a disappointing result for Virgin Australia.

The Department of Transport report found that rural route passengers fared best, with the Cairns-Townsville service having the highest proportion of on-time arrivals (89.1%) and the Adelaide-Alice Springs service having the highest percentage of on-time departures (91.9%).

The cancellation rate was greatest (6.1%) between Armidale and Sydney, followed by Melbourne and Sydney (5.8%), Sydney and Melbourne (5.6%), Melbourne and the Gold Coast (4.8%), Gold Coast and Newcastle (4.7%), and Melbourne and the Gold Coast (4.7%).

Broome Airport had the greatest proportion of on-time arrivals (87.3%). Mount Isa Airport had the highest percentage of on-time departures (84.4%).

Sunshine Coast Airport, Bonza’s newest hub, had the lowest proportion of on-time departures at 49.9 percent.