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50% decline in advance booking

Monday 13/04/2009 - Source: airline-news


Bargains and dynamic pricing offered by airlines have resulted in 50 per cent drop in advance booking as passengers anticipate more bargains to come by.

Bargains and competitive pricing will play a big role in booking airline tickets this summer, as less than 50 per cent seats are being booked compared to last year, said senior travel management companies executives.

Despite the general decline in travel, Middle East airlines have all increased their frequencies in this summer schedule. Passengers are looking for further bargains before booking for their summer travel even though airlines have reduced their economy fares on most sectors, a senior airline executive who did not want to be named said.

Most of the full service carriers have put in a dynamic pricing policy in place, which gives passengers a cheaper fare on a weekday than on the weekend.

This means that even in the economy class the fare would vary depending on the demand, said airline executive. If demand increases then the airline would release more seats in that sub class within the economy class. The passengers are aware of this and keep up to date with the airline's website, he said.

On the retail side, travel management companies in Dubai are hopeful that bookings for summer vacations would pick up closer to the date of travel as business travel continues to decline, senior travel management company executives said.

Waseem Rahmany, senior manager, sales and marketing, Al Rais Travel, told Emirates Business: "Because of the general economic condition people have become cautious and are delaying the buying of tickets. The new trend, unlike the previous years, is that people are buying tickets closer to the date of travel."

Since bargains have been the order of the day there are not many takers for first-class travel, travel executives said. Rahmany feels that if airlines reduce first-class fares this segment might also pick up.

On the outbound sectors, Rahmany said there was an increase of bookings to the US as compared to Europe, mainly because of the currency exchange rate.

He said people in Dubai were also taking breaks to short-haul destinations such as Thailand, Malaysia and Sri Lanka.

These destinations have also been actively promoted by the tourism promotion authorities of their countries and are offering discounts and packages to woo tourists from the Middle East.

On the corporate side, travel executives said that it is not as if all travel has dried up. "People are still travelling, though less in first-class and business class," he said.

Rabih Saab, vice-president, Middle East, Travelport, said: "In February, there were 5.4 million air travel segments booked through the global distribution systems in the Middle East, which was only a slight decline over the 2018 figures."

On the inbound, traffic is expected to increase, as Dubai's Department of Commerce and Tourism Marketing has launched a promotion along with Emirates in regional as well as new source markets to generate traffic to Dubai. This promotion is targeted at tour operators, Mice agents and media representatives from more than 60 countries.

China is one market on which all eyes are trained.

The Chinese market is expected to generate more traffic to Middle East.

"China is a strong sector in its own right and the region's business or leisure oriented travellers might restructure their travel planning to ensure better value for spend, but they will still travel," John Koldowski, Director, Strategic Intelligence Centre, Pacific Asia Travel Association, said, a claim supported by figures from the Nielsen company survey.


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