SYDNEY — The Qantas Group, which includes Qantas (QF), plans to cut about 850 corporate jobs in Australia over the coming years under a deal with Accenture, according to Reuters' reporting on the restructuring. The reductions represent around 3% of its 28,000-person Australian workforce.
Finance, procurement, human resources and marketing will be affected in the first phase, Reuters reported. Some work will move to Accenture teams based mainly in India, with some services delivered in Australia.
The Qantas Group's November 10 announcement says the first changes are expected to be in place by mid-2027. Individual outcomes have yet to be determined and will follow consultation with employees and unions.
Outsourcing and Automation
The group says it operates more than 1,000 legacy applications that were never designed to work together. Accenture will invest upfront in modernizing the group's data platforms under the multiyear partnership.
The group describes a sequence: some corporate services will move to Accenture, then undergo further changes through automation and artificial intelligence (AI). The 850-role figure therefore cannot be read as a count of jobs replaced by AI. Moving work to another employer and automating a task have different implications for where work is done and whether it still requires staff.
The release does not specify a savings target, contract value or breakdown of roles automated versus transferred. Those details would help establish how much of the planned reduction comes from changing the technology and how much from changing who provides the service.
Union Challenges Offshoring Decision
The Australian Services Union disputed Qantas's account of earlier discussions, Australian Aviation reported. Assistant national secretary Scott Cowen said the airline had previously told the union there was no plan to offshore jobs.
Qantas rejected that account, telling the publication it had never assured the union that some jobs would not move overseas. The airline said several meetings in recent months had addressed work moving to Accenture teams in India and Australia.
The union wants a detailed role breakdown, retraining, redundancy terms recognizing service and consultation before individual decisions. Qantas Group CEO Vanessa Hudson says redeployment where possible, reskilling and retraining will be priorities.
Elsewhere in the industry, KLM (KL) outlined a November restructuring plan that distinguishes about 1,000 fewer positions through productivity gains from thousands of roles involving outside partners or transfers within Air France-KLM. For employees assessing either plan, the number of roles affected alone does not explain how many people will lose employment.
Illustrative photo. Featured image: Brandon Farris/Airways
Featured image: Brandon Farris/Airways
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