Virgin Australia beats Qantas for business travel, says survey

Doesn't surprise me one bit, flown on both airlines 738 and was much more impressed with virgin. They seem so much more lively and pleasant. But that may just be me.

While I generally only fly Qantas, this does not surprise me. Flew PER-MEL in J on VA a month back and was very impressed. Totally blows Qantas away in domestic J. The only thing that was a let down was the lounge in Perth. Its a shocker.

Be interesting to see how many business class seats were filled on each airline. I typically fly early morning and evening flights for best use of time, and i still see qantas business cabin full at least 90% of the time, but virgin business cabin rarely is at 50% capacity. Couldnt comment on the majority of 'day' flights though. Be glad of others comments...

As much as I enjoy flying Virgin (Plat with both VA and QF), as I think that they beat Qantas hands-down coast to coast, Qantas remains my preference  on every other domestic route.

Availability of flights and Qantas' ability to handle things during irregular operations is in my opinion much better. The lounge situation on the ground with Virgin isn't brilliant (I know many disagree with me) and the lack of recognition overseas without being a member of a big alliance is a little frustrating. I appreciate that Virgin has made great progress and that Rome wasn't built in a day, but Qantas still wins for me for now.

We're all going to have our personal preferences so I think the best thing to take away from this study is that we have two quality business friendly airlines.

Which one is best for us really comes down to what we personally need, so it's hard to say from a distance which one is 'better' in real terms.

It's also most probably the reason many people now feel they can share their business travel between the two airlines.

Having flown J class on both QF and VA in recent months, I found them both to be very good. However, IFE on the older QF 763 was ordinary, as was VA's 738 inflight entertainment options. It's impossible to eat a meal and watch the tablet device at the same time. The service by the FA's on bothy airlines was fantastic. One thing though, why would VA have invested so much into J class and not have a foot rest on their 737's is somewhat strange.

I am generally satisfied flying either airline, but I find QF to be a more 'complete' product than VA (ie. domestic business lounges, OW alliance, quality of business class seats, international connections, etc) and hence the airline I choose to fly if I can. But VA has the advantage on price (business class wise), ease at obtaining gold/platinum status, and a more lively and friendly cabin crew.

As many people here may know I switched from Qantas to Virgin after VA introduced business class and did their 'status match'. I'm very satisifed with Virgin, but the few times I have had to fly Qantas domestic they have been okay too. East-west is still rubbish because of the A330 seats but the meals have certainly improved, and if you have Platinum status the Qantas Business Lounges are miles ahead of the Virgin Lounges.

This report certainly bears our my own experience and that of family, many of whom travel extensively for business. My own view is that the Virgin domestic lounge in Sydney is far superior to the Qantas club domestic lounge. Moreover, my last few flights on Virgin I flew economy and was pleasantly surprised by the level of personal service. Qantas, on the other hand, seemed to take more interest in my boarding pass than they did me. The one thing I'd like to see Virgin adopt is a Qantas style streamlined checkin system (e.g. Q-chip cards, Q bag tags etc) but at this stage it's not a deal breaker for me.

VA hands down. QA feels very serious and old, and I'm quite okay not being tied to an alliance. Perhaps I'm a hipster ..?

For context I'm an expat Aussie living in the United States, VA Platinum with flights mostly international, not AUS domestic. I may have a different view if I was regularly flying for biz in Australia, but I do doubt it.

It amazes me that Qantas is able to achieve an 82% satisfaction rating for its domestic J class, and I'd have predicted the differential between the two carriers would be far greater than 4%.  In my experience, more than half of the planes flying east coast to Perth are configured with cramped, recliner-style seating, and the food and drinks service has still not reached VA levels. I've sworn off flying QF coast to coast until the new cabins come online - the prices they charge for the product they offer (on most flights) is ridiculous.

On other shorter domestic flights, I think it's a closer call, although the sad, tired old seats on QF 734s and older 738s probably means VA wins there too.

I began flying Virgin late last year, and after years flying Qantas, I've not regretted making the switch (not even after a couple of Qantas flights to check if I was missing much).

Andy, just to clarify qf staff can choose business class fares and pay more for their leisure travel, Virgin staff cannot. It's economy only for tech, cabin, groundcrew and engineers. I do miss the pointy end after working at Ansett for 10yrs.....but it's a different world now.