Qantas expects its layoff and outsourcing plan to affect around 850 corporate roles in Australia over the coming years. The airline is handing some back-office work to Accenture, whose teams in India will deliver most of the services that move. Qantas expects the first changes to be in place by mid-2027. It says individual outcomes will be determined after talks with staff and their unions. Qantas announcement

The Qantas layoffs at a glance

Which jobs are affected first?

The first wave covers parts of finance, procurement, human resources and marketing, according to the email Qantas Group chief executive Vanessa Hudson sent to staff. The roughly 850 roles represent about 3% of the group’s Australian workforce of 28,000, Reuters reported. The headline figure covers the changes Qantas expects over several years. The airline has yet to give a breakdown by department or say how many roles will be affected in the first wave. Reuters reporting

The announcement concerns corporate work. It comes as Qantas is hiring in other parts of the business. The group says it has created more than 4,400 operational roles since 2023, including jobs for pilots, cabin crew and engineers. Those hires help explain how the airline can grow its overall Australian workforce while cutting corporate positions. They tell us little about which openings will be available to a finance or HR employee whose current job changes. Qantas workforce figures

What Accenture is taking on in India

Accenture will take over selected services within those corporate functions. The work moving to Accenture will be delivered mainly from India, with some of it handled by teams in Australia. That is the extent of the location detail in the announcement. It gives no city-by-city breakdown for India and no estimate of how the work will be divided between the two countries. Partnership announcement

For readers in India, the number to keep straight is 850. It measures the expected impact on roles at Qantas. Accenture has yet to publish a hiring target for the work or say which openings, if any, will be advertised. A vendor can assign work to existing staff or recruit for specific needs. The announcement does not say which approach Accenture will take here, so the deal itself gives job seekers no vacancy count or application timeline.

Why Qantas brought in Accenture

Qantas is using the same deal to change how corporate services are delivered and to replace or connect parts of its ageing technology. Hudson told staff the group uses more than 1,000 older applications that were built without a common design. Think of a finance team trying to reconcile figures held in separate systems. Before it can speed up the work, it needs to know which records agree and which ones need a manual check. That example shows why the data work matters. Qantas has not listed the specific finance systems it plans to change. ABC News reporting

Accenture will put money into updating the group’s data platforms early in the partnership. Qantas also says it already spends more than A$1 billion a year on technology. That is the group’s existing annual technology spend. The announcement gives no price for the Accenture contract. Separately, Qantas expects its Product Innovation Centre in Adelaide to grow to more than 400 roles. That centre is a separate part of its technology investment, and Qantas has given no indication that it can absorb all the corporate roles affected by this deal. Qantas technology plans

Where AI fits into the job cuts

Qantas describes a sequence. Some work moves to Accenture, the companies update the underlying systems, and over time they plan to use automation and AI to change how more of that work gets done. The announcement gives no count of positions that a specific tool could replace. For employees in the first phase, the immediate issue is who will do their team’s work and which jobs will still exist at Qantas after the handover. For more context, see our report on how tech companies explain layoffs and AI investment.

Why the union is pushing back

The Australian Services Union says it was previously told there was no plan to move jobs offshore. Qantas disputes that account. A spokesperson told Reuters the airline had discussed the possibility of some work moving to Accenture teams in India and Australia with the union over several months. The disagreement matters to workers because it concerns when they were told that work could leave Australia and what they were given a chance to discuss before the public announcement. Reuters on the union response

What happens before mid-2027?

Qantas says it will talk to affected staff and their unions before deciding individual outcomes. The airline plans to look for other jobs in the group where possible and offer retraining and support. Moving to another role within Qantas would be one possible outcome of that process. How many people can move will depend in part on the openings available and whether they match employees’ skills and locations. Qantas on consultation and redeployment

The next updates to watch are the number of positions in the first wave, the services each department will hand over and the number of employees who find other jobs inside the group. For India, watch for actual Accenture listings linked to the work. For staff in Australia, the details that matter are the team-level changes and redeployment options that come out of consultation.

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