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Shubhra Tandon
Mumbai, Sept. 8
If you have travel plans between October and December, and plan to take a flight, then hurry up and make your bookings to bag that ‘best fare'.
The travel fraternity expects fares to climb up from October by as much as 20-25 per cent from present levels during the winter season, surging on increased demand.
Further, an industry representative explains, there might not be an announcement of fare increase from the airlines. However, as demand picks up and seat inventory starts depleting, the last seats to go will be at a premium.
In fact, the airlines did remain silent, with Jet Airways officials not wanting to comment on the issue. A Kingfisher Airlines spokesperson said that there was “no plan to raise fares at this time.”
Fare increase
Air India also ruled out any immediate plans of increasing fares. Low-cost carriers SpiceJet and Indigo did not answer queries sent to them.
“Right now average fares across sectors are ranging between Rs 3,600 and Rs 3,700. But depending on days, say around Christmas, Diwali or New Year they would go up to as high as Rs 7,000. Same time last year, we saw fare on New Delhi-Mumbai sector at Rs 10,000 on certain days,” Yatra.com's head of air business, Ms Bhawana Agarwal told Business Line.
However, when compared to last year, the fares might hover at same level because as the demand has picked up, airlines are also adding capacity into the market, she said.
Kingfisher Airlines did recently say that it would be re-instating more than 10 per cent of the capacity in the coming winter schedule. The airline rationalised capacity by 21 per cent across its network which included return of 19 aircraft over the last 18-monts. GoAir plans to add two new aircraft to its fleet in the next couple of months. JetLite will be importing two Boeing 737-800 aircraft in November.
With regard to bookings, Cleartrip.com said it has seen a jump of 40 per cent in ticket bookings for the September to December period compared to the same time last year, in the domestic market. “For international travel, our bookings have almost doubled from last year,” said Cleartrip's Vice-President, Marketing, Mr Noel Swain.
Yatra, on the other hand, is seeing 9,500 ticket bookings a day, said Ms Agarwal. Industry-wide it would range between 8,000 and 9,000 a day, which would be 20-25 per cent more than last year, she said.