Qantas has moved to address nation-leading flight cancellation rates on the Sydney to Canberra route, adjusting its schedule from next week and adding larger aircraft for capital flights.
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Flights between Canberra and Sydney topped the nation for cancellations in September, with Department of Infrastructure and Regional Development statistics showing cancellations reached 8.1 per cent of all flights, ahead of Sydney to Melbourne flights at 7.5 per cent and Melbourne to Sydney at 7.4 per cent.
Qantas and Virgin Australia flights from Canberra and regional Queensland destinations have had higher than normal cancellation rates in recent weeks, caused by aircraft maintenance delays, operational issues and higher than usual demands on reserve crew members.
Training for a large intake of new Qantas pilots is understood to have seen some disruption for passengers nationally.
Experts said fewer public service flights, falling profits and lower passenger demand could be seeing more cancellations for Canberra, while passengers in Sydney have been told staffing shortages and competing priorities on other routes were adding to the problem.
Airlines face ongoing ripple effects when flights are cancelled or delayed, but the changes are expecting to see significant improvements for Canberra flyers from next month including at peak travel times.
A Qantas spokeswoman said passengers should see improvements relatively quickly.
"We're very mindful that delays and cancellations are frustrating, and we're disappointed that our standard of service has fallen below what's expected.
"To improve levels of reliability, we have made adjustments to parts of our domestic schedule. These include consolidating flights during non-peak times to free up aircraft and putting larger aircraft on key routes to maintain capacity.
"These changes will start flowing through from next week and we expect to see a significant reduction in cancellation rates in the impacted ports."
Data showed 59 cancelled flights on both the Canberra to Sydney route and Sydney to Canberra in September, far higher than the 30 cancellations between Canberra and Melbourne in the same period.
In September, Qantas cancelled 32 flights from Sydney to Canberra, 6.8 per cent of its schedule for the month, while Virgin cancelled 27 flights, or 10.5 per cent.
Qantas cancelled 31 flights in the other direction, or 6.6 per cent, while Virgin cancelled 28 flights, or 10.9 per cent of its schedule.
Nationally, cancellations represented 2.7 per cent of all scheduled flights, up from 1.7 per cent a month earlier.
The national rate of cancellations was higher than the long term average of 1.4 per cent, the figures showed.
Last week, Canberra Airport's owners called for the federal government to investigate higher than average flight cancellation rates from Sydney and to consider introducing new national performance benchmarks.
Managing director Stephen Byron approached Transport Minister Darren Chester's office for assistance in reducing cancellations.
Former Qantas economist Tony Webber said last week the number of passengers flying between Canberra and Sydney had fallen by 12.5 per cent since 2010, resulting in excess capacity on a route which is difficult to fill seats using discount fares.
