Thousands of Regional Express customers are scrambling to find new flights after the airline went into voluntary administration and cancelled trips between major city airports.

Rex’s regional flights are operating as usual and a rival airline has chipped in to help get its capital city route customers onto alternate flights.

Virgin Australia said 4600 Rex customers had reached out by early Wednesday morning, and 500 had already been booked onto new flights.

Impacted customers with tickets on cancelled Rex flights can transfer free of charge to Virgin services.

A statement posted on Rex’s website late on Tuesday said the administration affected parent company Regional Express Holdings Limited and a number of its subsidiaries trading under the Rex Group name.

Samuel Freeman, Justin Walsh and Adam Nikitins of Ernst & Young Australia have been appointed joint administrators by the Rex board.

Rex’s regional Saab 340 flights are unaffected and continue to operate but the 737 services – which cover major cities, including the busy Sydney-to-Melbourne route it began operating in 2021 – have been grounded.

Rex and Virgin Australia are also exploring ways to support regional customers, including Virgin selling Rex’s regional services through codeshare or interline arrangements, and making Virgin frequent flyer benefits available to Rex’s regional customers.

Rex employs about 2000 people in total and Virgin is offering those affected by the grounding of the 737s the chance to apply for open positions via the airline’s website.

Transport Workers Union national secretary Michael Kaine said it was a difficult day for those Rex staff.

“We again are in this situation … aviation seems to be in crisis,” he told ABC TV.

“What we want to do is figure out (with our) shoulder to the wheel, what we can do to minimise their angst … Virgin is putting steps in place to take expressions of interest from the workforce, and that’s really critical.” 

Virgin Australia CEO Jayne Hrdlicka said Rex should have contacted affected customers by now and Virgin staff stand ready to try and ease their confusion.

“All they need to do is call and rebook their flight to show they’ve got a booking reference number from Rex that gives them the ability to rebook with us,” she told ABC radio.

“We’re trying to accommodate people as close to their time of departure as possible.

“We’ll be ongoing to support the regional business to ensure that it is successful because we do believe they’re a really important part of the industry.”

Treasurer Jim Chalmers said it was a “big relief” that Rex will keep servicing regional areas while it’s in administration.

The federal government has had discussions with the airline about a support package, he added.

“Obviously, there’s been discussions but … we want to hear next from the company,” Dr Chalmers told ABC TV.

“Our top priority (is) to make sure we can continue to serve and service regional communities and regional economies because we know how important it is – we’re prepared to play a constructive role,” he told ABC TV.

Many regional communities rely on the carrier, which emerged 22 years ago following the collapse of Ansett.

Unlike Bonza, which went into voluntary administration in April, Rex mainly owns rather than leases its planes.

Rex’s key fleet comprises 61 SAAB 340s and seven leased Boeing 737-800s, out of 123 aircraft.

Since the pandemic, Rex has struggled with profitability. In February, it reported a bottom line net loss of $3.2 million for the first half of the 2023/24 financial year.

Rex shares last traded at 56.5 cents on Friday, when it went into a trading halt. They were around 79 cents a month ago.