TonyBurr

I received an e-mail today from QATAR with the heading, "PHL We Have Listened to You". They changed the PHL-DOH departure from morning until the night. Who did they "listen" to? Who did they ask? I find this insulting when the airline wanted to changed it for whatever reason ( and I do not like the new time) and then try to make it sound like people asked for it. Be honest. YOU decided to change the time, not the people of PHL.

Dr. HFH

Do you have any specific information which leads you to the conclusion that they made the change because they wanted to and not because they listened to customers?

IAN-UK

Yup - I think we gathered you don't like the new time .... but I think you have thrown yourself in the vox populi role you accuse QR of assuming.

Could be your opinion represents a very skinny minority, while the good people of Philadelphia have been clamouring for change, and big-hearted QR finally relented

Downunderdesert

It will certainly help pick up a few more passengers. It’s been well known on the employee side, for those that can afford to travel and want to go to the United States, PHL is one of the best options due to the emptiness of the plane as it does not connect to/from India.

FlyerRed5

It actually was commercial reasons - the route has been under-performing for a long while as, was correctly pointed out above, the flight does not connect to/from India. This lack of connectivity has always been the routes shortcoming. Now more than 20 additonal cities can connect with more favorable connection times.

If anything, this puts more strain on the terminal facilities in the morning US departure wave. There are only a finite number of gates that have secondary screening facilities and now 100% of these will be used in the morning. If even one of these became unusable for whatever reason, the flight planned for that gate would have to be delayed as remote stands can't be used as they won't meet the requirements for secondary screening.

PHLGovFlyer

As a fellow Philadelphian I was pleased when they announced the timing change. In 2017 I had a choice to fly a one stop flight to GOI on QR with a veeeery long layover at DOH, or a two stop flight via LHR and BOM on AA/BA/AI. I took the two stop flight because it allowed me to leave much later in the day and the timings were better.

So now it's apparently one vote for and one vote against: A tie!

lizakramer

Does the email say when the change will go into effect? I just booked a flight 2 weeks ago PHL-MLE via DOH in November 2018 and the schedule is still showing a morning departure from PHL.

florens

February 1st.

remdk

lizakramer The changes are in the timetable until 27 th October. However 28 October the next winter timetable starts and the old times return!
If this is deliberate in that QR may want to judge customer reaction before implementing the change permanently, an error in updating the timetable or even that since it after the second major timetable change from now it has been ignored, we do not know.
You need to keep an eye on your reservation to see if and when it changes. QR are not known for notifying you of such changes.

Dr. HFH

I have a dinner at a restaurant of your choice in Bangkok that says that it's simply a question of updating next winter's timetable not being a priority at this time.

Often1

Businesses always characterize changes as having been done for the consumer's benefit.

In this case that is certainly true overall as it benefits the PHL business travel community and even permits better use of PHL as a connection point.

Whether it benefits you is always an open question.

While nobody is sitting there counting comments on every flight, smart carriers do speak with their top customers (meaning the TA's who sell tickets and large businesses which buy tickets) about perceptions and what could be done to increase sales. Some of this is not likely to be anything such as pure scheduling advice, but large customers saying something like, "we book away from you because we need our people in India and PHL-India is not viable on your schedule",

Grmaht

I’m schedued to fly Doha to Philly and back. Outbound in August shows the late morning departure from Doha arriving into Philly in the afternoon based on the retimed flights. My return for dec 9 shows morning 09:40 departure from PHL. Any information if the QR schedule just hasn’t been updated for Winter ‘18 or if the schedule change Qatar implement wasn’t permanent?

ksb

I contacted QR about this a few weeks ago. They said that the change was temporary. The switchback to the morning departure time happens in late October or early November, I think.

Dr. HFH

Interesting. So the PHL trips I booked because of the low fare even though I'm really going to BOS are going to have a >2 hour time change. Does that mean that I'll be able to change from PHL to BOS at no cost?

Grmaht

Looks like the change rolls back October 27th. In terms of the schedule change what you booked at the time still holds. If that schedule does change and QR revises the flight timings you may have some