The Qantas Airways Limited (ASX: QAN) share price is slightly in the red today.
Qantas shares are falling 0.22% at the time of writing, currently trading at $4.49 each. For perspective, the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) is down 0.13% today.
So what is new at Qantas today?
Qantas highlights new staff, more resources
The Qantas share price is outperforming fellow ASX 200 travel shares today. The Webjet Limited (ASX: WEB) share price is down 2.10% today, while Flight Centre Travel Group Ltd (ASX: FLT) shares are 0.99% in the red.
Qantas domestic and international CEO Andrew David has revealed the airline is hiring more staff. He said since Easter, Qantas has hired 1,000 people.
Speaking on 2GB radio, David issued an apology to listeners, adding:
We are the national carrier, people have high expectations of us, we have high expectations of ourselves and clearly over the last few months we have not been delivering what we did pre-COVID
David said the company has put a "lot of resources" into call centres, leading to single digit response times last week.
Commenting on 13 flight cancellations in Sydney yesterday, David said "our cancellation rate is now close to what it was pre-COVID, it's not quite there yet". He added that mishandled bag numbers are almost at pre-COVID levels too, commenting:
On average pre-COVID we had about five mishandled bags in every thousand, when I checked this morning, yesterday it was about seven
In June, BITRE on-time performance figures showed 59.4% of Qantas network planes arrived on time, with 40.6% late. Cancellation rates were 7.5% in June.
As highlighted in a market update in late June, Qantas is reducing domestic flight numbers from October until the end of March 2023.
Qantas share price snapshot
The Qantas share price has descended 4% in the past year and 10% in the year to date.
For perspective, the ASX 200 has slid nearly 9% in the last 12 months.
Qantas has a market capitalisation of nearly $8.5 billion based on the current share price.
