Qantas Haneda Flights - challenges and opportunities

With the departure of Virgin Australia’s Cairns – Tokyo Haneda (HND) service in 2025, Qantas secures an extra daily slot into Japan’s Haneda from the International Air Services Commission (IASC). With a total of 3 daily services, Qantas is proposing key changes to its current twice daily Sydney (SYD) to HND service and daily Melbourne (MEL) & Brisbane (BNE) to Tokyo Narita (NRT), which is a more distant airport compared with HND.  While this has not be finalised, the new schedule presents challenges and opportunities, including for beyond and behind traffic

 Current Schedule:

 Proposed (Not Finalised) Schedule

What does this mean for passengers?

With anticipated growth of returning travellers, Japan can expect these passengers to opt for a holiday destination other than its usual first-time visitors. Instead of returning to Japan’s main attraction cities, Tokyo, Kyoto or Osaka, re-visits are expected to extend into the secondary cities like Sapporo, Fukuoka & Okinawa.

Qantas’ current SYD – HND lunchtime flight arrives too late into Tokyo, resulting in very limited options to achieve a same-day connection to other cities in Japan, forcing passengers to an overnight stay, transit or onwards flight.  This impacts its “Quality of Service Index” (QSI) scores for beyond flight tickets, relative to its competitors.

Upon Qantas’ commencement of its new three daily service, the removal of the earlier 12pm flight only seems to guarantee a same-day connection to be impossible. This leaves a single late-night departure that arrives at HND 5:20am to then connect to that following day’s domestic flights.

While MEL and BNE will benefit by accessing a more convenient airport in HND, the proposed times for the MEL & BNE flights are later than the NRT flights, making it almost impossible to connect to many beyond destinations within Japan, with the last flight to Sapporo departing at 930pm.  A further challenge exists at Fukuoka (FUK), where an early curfew makes it impossible to schedule an additional 830pm HND FUK flight.  For behind travellers originating from Adelaide, Hobart or Canberra and whose destination is Sapporo or Fukuoka, it would make more sense to connect to the Tokyo flight in SYD rather than BNE or MEL

Although the new proposed times may benefit travellers ending at HND, it becomes cumbersome for those seeking onwards travel. This can potentially result in Qantas losing passengers who may resort to flying with a different carrier offering better connections or direct flights at higher prices.

Why would flights be scheduled in such a way?

These flight times are configured in way that ultimately benefits the airline’s existing network. Large changes can have ripple effects that disrupt other flights. In doing so, Qantas can preserve its current schedule flying in and out of MEL, BNE & SYD.

Not only that but for business travellers heading into Haneda prefer a well-rested overnight flight, for an early arrival before commencing work duties. A small price to pay for inconvenient connecting flight options, this proposed schedule ultimately maintains stability in Qantas’ network.

Footnote: The author wishes to acknowledge the contribution of Gabriel Leung, Bach. Aviation Management in researching and drafting this article.