Flying abroad gets cheaper

If it’s raining slashed airfares in the domestic sector, the overseas sector is not parched either. Airlines are as aggressively offering promotional fares, as passenger numbers dip.
Jet Airways, Air India, Singapore Airlines and other carriers have come out with discounts ranging between 30% and 60% on foreign routes.

Naresh Goyal-owned Jet Airways, which announced a 15-40% fare cut in the local market, is currently offering discounted fares on Southeast Asian and West Asian routes like Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Bahrain and Oman.

According to a company spokesperson, the ticket prices on these sectors are close to 25% lower than what they were in the peak season — October 15 to January 15.
The lower fares will be available till March 31, when the lean season ends.

From January 15, state-owned Air India’s fares on the Mumbai-New York sector will drop by over 45% from Rs 55,000 (including taxes) per passenger to Rs 28,000-29,000 per passenger.

Singapore Airlines, which has seen competition on Southeast Asian routes intensify over the last one year, is also snipping fares on its flights linking India and Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Bangkok, Denpasar, Langkawi, Kuching, Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne.

Air travel to these foreign destinations from New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Ahmedabad on a Singapore Airlines flight would be 40-60% less costly than last month.

Anoop Kanuga, managing director of travel agency Bhathija Travels Pvt Ltd, said the aggressive offers by airlines are an attempt to spur people to take overseas trips, whose numbers have dipped considerably this year. 

“The schemes being offered this year are much more attractive than last year, because people are not ready to spend as much on flying as last year,” he said.  He  expects a spurt in such offers by the end of this month.

One overseas operator which is not looking at coming out with any promotional offer, is Vijay Mallya’s Kingfisher Airlines. The full service carrier has started flying between Mumbai and London from January 5.

“We will neither discount our fares nor come out with any special scheme,” said a Kingfisher Airlines spokesperson.