SAA flight cuts just not enough

It was clear two decades ago that low-cost airlines were the future of short-haul aviation.

It was clear two decades ago that low-cost airlines were the future of short-haul aviation. Since then, we’ve witnessed low-cost carriers emerge on every continent. Yet, SAA persisted with its dual-class cabins and premium fares on domestic routes, only offloading the Durban-Cape Town one to a low-cost subsidiary in 2010 when it was deep in the throes of what has become a never-ending “restructuring”.

The Joburg-Cape Town and Joburg-Durban routes remained flooded with dual-class cabins. Up until this week, SAA was flying nine return flights a weekday to Durban and as many as 16 return flights a weekday to Cape Town.

SAA doesn’t need to operate premium services on domestic routes, where the longest flight time is two hours.

Now, while SAA was five years late to the low-cost airline game, it should be beating Kulula at its own game.

Reading between the lines of the December announcement that SAA would be ceding a large number of its Joburg-Durban and Joburg-CT flights to Mango, it was clear that SAA couldn’t operate these profitably. Or that Mango could operate these more profitably.

The game has changed. Kulula forced this change, but others such as FlySafair (and Mango) are capitalising on this structural change in the market.

The problem for SAA is that its low-cost strategy didn’t go far enough. It was right to set up Mango as an independent subsidiary, freed from the constraints, convoluted supply agreements and high labour costs of its parent. But, Mango should’ve taken over all of SAA’s domestic routes in less than five years.

Extravagances, such as the free flights gifted to parliamentarians, their spouses and children; business class tickets for ministers; and freebies to SAA retirees ought to have been scrapped years ago. A side-effect of a move to change these rules is that Comair’s British Airways operation would’ve suffered too (it also benefits from government travel).

Mango should be SAA’s domestic carrier, full stop.

Smaller regional routes that can’t be operated profitably by SA Express or Mango should be privatised (many have effectively been ceded to Airlink). If any of these are strategic in nature and will likely be loss-making, the routes should be subsidised directly by government.

That leaves SAA to focus on being a regional, long-haul airline. And while, for political reasons, it holds monopolies on many routes on the continent, it should focus on ensuring it operates these as efficiently and competitively as possible.

The change announced in December, which will be largely complete next month, gets SAA halfway there.

Already, Mango exclusively operates all Lanseria capacity (to CT and Durban), as well as routes focused on leisure travellers (Jhb-George, Jhb-PE, CT-Durban, CT-Bloem, Jhb-Zanzibar). With the “rationalisation” from February, around 330 domestic return flights a week will be operated by SAA, versus marginally more by Mango (excluding Zanzibar).

Hilton Tarrant works at immedia.

Mango should be SAA’s domestic carrier