Originally Posted by
travelislife
I would love to know if any of this stuff actually has an effect on bookings though. On FF sites all of this gets debated frequently, but unless it is having a negative affect on bookings Qantas will keep reducing the service offered.
I am not sure about this route as it's a bit of a 'funny' one without a lot of competition.
QF 21 leaves SYD at night. JL 772 (the only direct competitor) leaves SYD in the morning.
Leaving SYD in the morning is probably a bad thing for business people except if they are travelling on a weekend. It's certainly bad for connecting passengers as it leaves too early to get there on the same day (it rules it out for me unless I have schedule flexibility to go to SYD the night before).
JQ 11/25 leaves OOL/CNS in the morning. You can potentially connect to it from elsewhere, e.g. SYD but the lack of beds is bad.
Both QF 22/JL 711 leave NRT within 10 min of each other. JQ 12/26 also leave NRT at night to OOL/CNS respectively, not far off the departure time of QF 22/ JL 711. Of course, the lack of beds on JQ is a major issue on that flight.
If there is a way of combining QF21 and JL771 and get a reasonable fare, it's a decent option (old JL J seat is a bit worse than the QF ones IMO but not that much worse). Otherwise, there isn't a good alternative as far as I'm concerned. So, perhaps not a lot of impact on the load (due to lack of alternatives) and it might be the reason why they target this flight with catering downgrade despite a relatively early departure.