Jeremy O'Brien: Air NZ Chief Customer and Digital Officer on staff planning more industrial action

Thousands of Air New Zealand customers are being warned to be prepared as the airline braces for an upcoming strike.

The airline has been forced to make schedule changes and 44 flights have been cancelled ahead of the industrial action planned for February 12 and 13.

Air NZ Chief Customer and Digital Officer Jeremy O'Brien says the airline will be ensuring that the impact on customers will be as minimal as possible.

"If you do need to change plans and you do incur reasonable costs for transport, accommodation, meals - the customer should look to have those reimbursed as well."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now, almost ten thousand Air New Zealand customers have had
their travel plans ruined by an upcoming strike action. So
forty four flights have been canceled for Thursday and Friday
because the cabin crew striking over paying conditions. Many of
the flights have been rebooked, but that may not be
enough for disrupted plans. Air New Zealand's Chief Customer and
Digital Officer, Jeremy O'Brien is with us on the side.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Jeremy, Yeah, get us new here.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
How are you and very well? Thank you? How many
of the affected flyers have had have been rebooked and
completely accommodated.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Yeah, so we've actually provided recommodation options for all of
the impacted customers on the flight two to three days
either side of the strike days. Now, for not every
customer that's going to be suitable, and for those customers
they are entitled to and should request either a credit
to fly data or a refund. But we have been
able to provide reaccommodation options to all customers.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Yeah, and customers are also Jeremy, correct me if I'm wrong,
but I understand they're also able to if they need
to claim things like accommodation from you guys, or any
kind of costs associated with disruptive travel. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:04):
Correct, So this is a controllable disruption. So the main
thing for us is to make sure that customers are
the impactmed minimized as much as possible. So if you
do need to change plans and you do incurre reasonable
cost bet for transport accommodation meals, then absolutely a customer

(01:24):
should look to have those reaburst as well.

Speaker 1 (01:26):
Okay, are most people being decent about it?

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yeah? Look, I mean I think most people are very reasonable,
and the reality is in most instances, people want to
get to where they're going to. In some circumstances there
will be time bound things that mean that the new
flight times aren't convenient, and therefore we absolutely again say
to customers, please do apply for a credit or a

(01:51):
refunder and we will process that for you.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
Right. Let me just get this right. So is it
all your international flights on Thursday and Friday?

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Yeah? So it's our wide body crew and our wide
body aircraft fly our long haul international flights so into
Asia and North America. What we have done is we
have limited the impact on our Tasman and Pacific island
flying because we're able to put on and narrow body
aircraft are the smaller jets on those flights. And then

(02:19):
for those long haul flights, we have provided alternative options
both on in New Zealand two to three days before
or after, but also alternatives are crossis Star Alliance and
other partner airlines as well. So we've exhausted every single
way in which we can reaccommodate our passengers as close
as possible to their original triple blake.

Speaker 1 (02:39):
Right, So, no one's going to be complaining about the
international Cora clubs being too busy on Thursday and Friday,
are they.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
Well, there'll be no there'll be no None of ours
long haul flights will be going out that day, so
they will be a little bit quiet, that's sure.

Speaker 1 (02:54):
Hey, Jeremy, what's going on? Somebody said to me, it's
been noted that the flight turning up. I don't know
if you can speak about this domestically, but apparently the
domestic flights are running a little bit more to time
this year. Are you guys making an effort?

Speaker 2 (03:09):
Look, I mean it's a real focus for us. We're
very aware that the first and foremost of the best
thing we can do is run our network on time
and to schedule, and so there's been a huge amount
of hard work going on in the background in order
for us to do that. We can continue to improve,
but it is a real focus for the business.

Speaker 1 (03:26):
Good stuff, Jeremy, it's always good to talk to you.
Thank you, mate, Jeremy O'Brien, who is in New Zealand
Chief Customer and Digital Office. That for more from Heather
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