Not one, but two puff pieces in today's advertising-friendly The Age!

Despite the hype, Qantas’ mid-air turnbacks are a sign of strong safety systems

Expect cheaper fares, fewer delays: Qantas chief Alan Joyce

When you’re the CEO of Qantas, people are always keen to tell you how they think the airline is doing. Whatever their feedback is, I always see it first and foremost as a reflection of the strong connection Australia has with its national carrier.

To be honest, we know that connection has been tested at times. Six months ago, a lot of people felt we’d let them down and the figures showed why. Almost half our flights were late, our rate of misplaced bags had more than doubled and we were cancelling up to 7 per cent of our schedule.

Perception-wise, it didn’t help that this came after some controversial restructuring decisions to make sure we survived COVID. And it didn’t matter that airlines around the world had the same problems as travel restarted. If your flight to the Gold Coast has just been cancelled, it doesn’t make you feel any better to hear the delays are worse in Amsterdam.

Knowing that we were routinely letting customers down was hugely disappointing for everyone at Qantas. Last August, we apologised and promised to fix it. And almost every week after that, things improved.

We’ve now been the most on-time of the major domestic airlines for five months in a row. Our service levels – bags, cancellations, catering and the call centre – are back to what customers expect from us.