Wagga flight cuts extended for months amid post-COVID fallout

Rex Airlines has announced an extension of cuts to several of its Riverina flight paths made last year, including on its Wagga routes.

On May 1, 2023, Rex reduced its Wagga-Melbourne flights down from 12 return flights per week to seven, while also reducing its Wagga-Sydney flights down from five per day on weekdays to just three.

When these cuts were announced, it was understood they would be in place for several months.

However on October 30, 2023, Rex extended them further, reducing flights on the Sydney-Griffith route from five weekday return flights down to just three.

At the same time, the airline reduced its Sydney-Narrandera service from three weekday flights to two and cut its Sydney-Albury flights from five to three, with weekend schedules also "tweaked".

The October cuts were initially set to remain in place until March 31, 2024, but Rex has now extended this to October 27.

In a statement, the airline said the extended reduction of services was "due to continuing dislocated supply chains post COVID ... heavily impacting the provision of aircraft spare parts, especially aircraft engine parts".

Rex general manager of network strategy Warrick Lodge said the extension was made with the intention to provide customers with greater certainty and reduce last-minute cancellations.

"As we have stated previously, Rex prefers to reduce services if it does not have the resources to fly them rather than continue to sell tickets for phantom flights and then cancelling them at the last minute," Mr Lodge said.

"Rex finds such deliberate last-minute cancellations to be unconscionable as a cancelled flight can bring about untold hardships to the affected parties including having money tied down for months if indeed the refunds materialise."

Mr Lodge said Rex "never cancels a flight last-minute for expediency or for cash flow purposes or to hoard airport slots" and the airline was committed to rebuilding its regional network.

"Rex intends to return to the standard flight schedules from October 27, 2024, subject to the situation improving," he said.