smart arse comment re qantas

[yaraboy]

Surprisingly I found BA on my last Vancouver Heathrow jaunt to have superior service. Especially notable as most of the stews were post menopausal
I fly JAL to Asia and find the service nearly flawless................Business but I suspect that things are OK in Working Class

[cottmann]

....I fly JAL to Asia and find the service nearly flawless................Business but I suspect that things are OK in Working Class

I fly on Thai-JAL codeshare flights and get the best of both - plus convenient flight
times

[danny99]

Sorry but you do not know what you are talking about.

There have always been airport charges [departure tax] which at some airports has to be collected by the carrier on behalf of the government or airport service company. This amounts to $10-20 in most cases. 90+% of the surcharge is because fuel costs have risen and they do not want to show a fare increase for the ticket [which is what it is anyay]. Plus it is a convenient way of quietly charging for even more of the total fuel cost. There has ALWAYS been a fuel cost! QANTAS along with BA and a few of their friends lead the way in socking the user with this surcharge [just look at their current record profit, the increased fuel prices are really hurting them, aren't they?].

So far QANTAS has never reduced this levy even when fuel prices fell back for many months.

Back to the DPS-SYD-DPS comparison; yes Garuda also charges a surcharge, currently $225 against the QANTAS $400. A comparison of early January flights shows Garuda [newer larger Airbus, full but lousy service] @ $US645 for cheapest available economy, and JetStar [QANTAS cheap airline with low cost without union labour] @ $US 1,218 [smaller older planes, service virtually non-existent. All prices including all charges.

Just last week QANTAS was fined $US70,000,000 in US for organising cartel, with the same friends, to overcharge on cargo prices....same, same!