Will QAN survive?, page-5090

Having just been to UK and Europe for weeks, but now back, they're imperfect but at least Europeans receive some consumer protection when using air travel as regulation EU 601 requires compensation to be paid for specified delays.

No such luck in Oz, where there is no such provision, and a very weak ACCC:

(from 'The Australian'):

"The consumer watchdog has found no evidence of price gouging by airlines, despite observing that the cheapest airfares have more than doubled in seven months.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s quarterly report on airlines released on Tuesday, said strong demand for flying was pushing up airfares ahead of Christmas, but ongoing capacity constraints were justified by pandemic-related resource challenges.

However, commissioner Anna Brakey warned that the ACCC would be monitoring airlines closely to ensure capacity was returned to the market in a timely manner to start easing pressure on fares.

“We would be concerned if airlines withheld capacity to keep airfares high”, Ms Brakey said.

Qantas was currently at 94 per cent of pre-Covid-19 capacity and not expecting to return to 100 per cent of 2019 levels until the first half of 2023. Virgin Australia planned to match pre-Covid-19 levels in December and January..."