Changes to VA shorthaul Asian flying

As expected by a lot of people Virgin Australia has today announced it will withdraw from the Perth - Phuket route and hand its Perth/Melbourne/Adelaide - Bali routes to subsidiary Tigerair.

Tigerair will take over the Bali flights from March, with the Phuket route being dropped from February.

Regulatory approval is still begin sought for Tigerair to operate a fleet of 3 all economy Boeing 737-800s on the Bali flights.  Tigerair has until now been an all A320 operator.

Virgin will redirect its capacity from these routes to an increase on Sydney/Melbourne - Christchurch as well as seasonal capacity increases on flights to Fiji and the Solomon Islands.  Virgin reduced its capacity into Christchurch as a result of the effect on passenger numbers from the Christchurch earthquakes.

These changes come on the back of the annual profit announcement from Virgin which was a bottom line net loss of $94M AUD.  It is expected that these changes along with a $1b cost saving program will return the airline to profitability in the near future.

Read more about the changes to these services via the Brisbane Times HERE