Jet Airways drops business class fares

Vistara, the Tata-Singapore Airlines' JV, is expected to launch operations by next month-end and will compete with Jet Airways for corporate business

Now, you can fly Delhi-Mumbai in a business class at less than Rs 5,000, typically the price of an economy class ticket on the route. Jet Airways has reduced its business class fares on domestic and international routes in a three-day sale as competition heats up in the domestic market.

Vistara, the Tata-Singapore Airlines’ joint venture, is expected to launch operations by next month-end and will compete with Jet Airways for corporate business.

Typically, business class fares on domestic routes are about five times higher than economy class fares. A day before the launch of Jet’s offer, business class seat on the Delhi-Mumbai route, on October 16 was being sold upwards of Rs 25,000. Even GoAir’s business class product was being sold for Rs 16,000.

Under the Jet Airways offer, discounted business class tickets are available for sale from Tuesday to Thursday for travel between October 16 and January 31, 2015.  Jet said the offer was available across its domestic destinations as well as several international routes like Singapore, London, Toronto, Bangkok, Dubai, Hong Kong and Dammam.

An all-inclusive one-way business class fare between Delhi-Mumbai will cost Rs 4,819 while the Mumbai-Delhi fare is priced at Rs 11,581. Similarly, Mumbai-Goa is available for Rs 4,819 and Mumbai-Hyderabad tickets are on offer for Rs 6,918. To give a perspective,  one-way economy class fare between Delhi and Mumbai for travel on Wednesday was priced upwards of Rs 4,699. One-way economy tickets on October 16 are priced upwards of Rs 2,999.

Gaurang Shetty, senior vice-president, commercial, Jet Airways, said, “We are certain that this unique special fare offer will provide exceptional value to our guests and prove to be extremely popular with them.”

A travel industry source said "Generally airlines discount tickets on flights which have light loads. Normally afternoon flights have low occupancy and discounted tickets are offered on such flights."