Qatar QSuite US Route Changes: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
As of March 31, Qatar now has its TPG Award-winning business class product on eight daily flights to seven US destinations: Boston, Chicago, Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston, Los Angeles, New York JFK (x2) and Washington Dulles.
That leaves just three US routes ( Atlanta, Miami and Philadelphia) that aren't being served with the Qsuite product -- one of which was supposed to get Qsuites on June 2. Unfortunately, recent Qatar tweaks to the US routes has delayed that launch.
Let's take a look at the good, bad and ugly changes to the Qatar Qsuite routes between Doha (DOH) and the United States.
The Good
So far in 2019, Qatar has launched Qsuite on three new US routes already: Boston, Dallas/Fort Worth and Los Angeles. With these additions, there's a whopping 2,408 Qsuite seats per week to and from the US.
And that number is going to increase sooner than expected. Qatar is accelerating the aircraft swap on the DFW route. Previously, Qatar was going to upguage the DFW route from a Boeing 777-300ER (42 business class seats) to an Airbus A350-1000 (46 business class seats) on July 1. That has now been accelerated to June 1 -- although there's a temporary swap back to the 777-300ER on June 15-22.
| Route | Aircraft Type | Flight # | Effective Date | Seats |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boston (BOS) | Boeing 777-300ER | 743 / 744 | 42 | |
| Chicago (ORD) | Boeing 777-300ER | 725 / 726 | 42 | |
| Dallas/Forth Worth (DFW) | Boeing 777-300ER | 729 / 730 | thru May 31, then June 15-22 | 42 |
| Dallas/Forth Worth (DFW) | Airbus A350-1000 | 729 / 730 | June 1 | 46 |
| Houston (IAH) | Boeing 777-200LR | 713 / 714 | thru May 31 | 42 |
| Houston (IAH) | Airbus A350-1000 | 713 / 714 | June 1 | 46 |
| Los Angeles (LAX) | Boeing 777-200LR | 739 / 740 | 42 | |
| New York JFK | Airbus A350-1000 | 701 / 702 | thru May 31 | 46 |
| New York JFK | Boeing 777-300ER | 701 / 702 | June 1 | 42 |
| New York JFK | Airbus A350-1000 | 703 / 704 | 46 | |
| Philadelphia (PHL) | Airbus A350-900 | 727 / 728 | September 1 | 36 |
| Washington Dulles (IAD) | Boeing 777-300ER | 707 / 708 | 42 |
The Bad
Effective March 31, Qatar reduced its frequencies to Miami (MIA) from daily to 5x weekly, cutting flights on Monday and Wednesday. That's bad news for award availability as that pulls 72 lie-flat business class seats from inventory every week. The Miami route is currently scheduled to maintain a non-Qsuite Airbus A350-900 through the end of 2019.
The Ugly
In mid-March, we noticed that the Philadelphia route would switch from a non-Qsuite Airbus A350-900 to a Qsuite Airbus A350-900 on June 2. Unfortunately, that unofficial launch has now been delayed.
As of the latest seat maps and schedules filed by the airline, the Philadelphia route is switching to a non-Qsuite Boeing 777-300ER from June 1 - August 31. That's a pretty ugly change for the summer travel season as it swaps from a solid 1-2-1 Airbus A350-900 to an aircraft arranged with 2-2-2 business class seating.
But it's not all ugly news. Philadelphia will still get a Qsuite product -- but it won't be until September 1 that Qatar switches back to an Airbus A350-900 with Qsuite:
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