Coup for Tasman Pacific

By DANIEL RIORDAN

Tasman Pacific Airways, formerly Ansett NZ and soon to be flying as Qantas NZ, has scored a major coup by wresting one of the country's biggest corporate travel accounts from Air New Zealand.

The Carter Holt Harvey account, for domestic travel on Tasman Pacific and international travel on Qantas, is believed to be worth about $10 million.

Although the contract has yet to be signed, sources close to the process say it is a done deal.

CHH corporate affairs manager Dellwyn Stuart said the company had been using a combination of Air NZ and Qantas for its travel and had yet to sign contracts on any new deal.

Both Tasman Pacific and Air NZ said they did not comment on customer contracts, although Air NZ spokesman Cameron Hill said it was a competitive market and companies frequently changed their airlines.

TVNZ is understood to have recently switched back from Tasman Pacific to Air New Zealand.

Tasman Pacific chief executive Kevin Doddrell said this week that the airline's first official flight as Qantas NZ would be on September 4.

However, the first aircraft sporting Qantas NZ colours will be flying this weekend.

In exchange for access to New Zealand skies, Qantas will allow Tasman Pacific to use its logo, uniforms, bookings system, safety and training procedures, flight numbers, and frequent-flyer programme. Mr Doddrell said more than 60,000 bookings would be transferred to the Qantas international reservations system that day, and flights would carry the QF code. Reservations staff were already training in Australia.