A survey has found in the period before Qantas announced it had hit hard times it was the favourite airline of Australian travellers.
The survey by booking website wotif.com was conducted before Qantas revealed in February that it would be cutting thousands of Australian jobs amid massive profit losses.
Wotif found that 41 per cent of the 14,800 Australians surveyed preferred to fly Qantas.
The second favourite airline of choice, Emirates, rated with 15.8 per cent, just a fraction ahead of Virgin Australia with 15.7 per cent of the vote. Singapore Airlines was the fourth favourite carrier (13 per cent).
When respondents were asked if they were most loyal to an Australian airline, 53 per cent said they were not.
Of the 47 per cent who said they were loyal to an Australian carrier, 56 per cent said their loyalty would change if the airline was taken over by a foreign investor.
That comes as an ominous sign for the Flying Kangaroo, with legislative moves to repeal caps on foreign ownership of the airline.
Despite this, the majority of Australians prefer to fly with brands they're familiar with.
Almost 73 per cent said they would not book a flight with an airline they'd never heard of. The main reason given for this was concerns about safety, followed by quality of service.
Other reasons were reliability and not knowing the airline's reputation.
Given the favouritism toward flying with Qantas, it's no surprise that a large majority (86 per cent) of people surveyed were Qantas Frequent Flyer members. But the figures show that many of us like to collect points across a number of programs.
Fifty-eight per cent of travellers were signed up to Virgin Australia's Velocity Frequent Flyer program and 14.5 per cent had Emirates Skywards memberships.
Wotif's Helen Demetriou says while Qantas was the preferred airline for travellers, more than half of respondents admitted their loyalty waned in relation to price.
When booking a domestic flight, price was the most important factor, followed by availability on the traveller's preferred dates, and then having a direct flight.
Those priorities were exactly the same for travellers choosing international flights.
"Unsurprisingly, price was the most important factor for travellers booking both domestic and international flights," says Demetriou."
* The wotif.com survey involved 14,839 Australian travellers
