Indigo sells half cup food showing full cup pic

 Isn't it cheating to misrepresent and sell?

Indigo airline shows this in their inflight menu. All food items are shown as full cup, filled to the brim.

These items cost 400 INR a cup. After you pay and place an order, Indigo staff will deliver this-filled less than 50%, which is outright cheating. Either show half cup in your menu or deliver what you've showed. 

Watch this reel [Watch on insta]

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Shrinidhi Hande (@enidhi)

Mangaluru Singapore direct flight Air India Express

Air India express has announced 3 direct flights from Mangaluru.

The most interesting one is Mangaluru-Singapore. No other airline serves this route currently. We've to got to Mumbai or Bengaluru and take another flight to Singapore

Return ticket costs about 18k, which is reasonable, if not cheap. (Cabin bag only)

Unfortunately code share flights are not yet bookable- Can't book a ticket to Bali from Mangaluru with change to Scoot or SQ flights in Singapore. Hopefully Air India express will sort this out.

Other new flights announced by Air India Express:

• Mangaluru- Delhi
• Mangaluru- Pune.

This is a great news for Udupi-Mangaluru and nearby travelers as it reduces dominance of Indigo in Mangaluru airport and gives few more options. 

Hopefully Akasa Air & Star Air also show some interest in Mangaluru and launch a few flights. Air Asia also should start Mangaluru-Kuala Lumpur flights.

Let us hope for more flying at lower fares in 2025

Indigo BLR Mauritius 32k ₹ direct flight

Indigo has announced direct flight between Bengaluru and Mauritius. And the best news is return ticket costs around 31-32k.

32k return is a good price- I had seen Mumbai Mauritius for 28-30k pre-covid. Post covid everything was 50k+ So a round trip for 32k is a good start. Hopefully other airlines flying to Mauritius get a cue and reduce their price a bit as well.

If you're looking for some destination to visit in 2025 summer, you can think of Mauritius. If I try to book for October/November 2025 Indigo wants 40k! which is bit unfair. Earlier we book, lower the price should be. If I could get October/November ticket for 25k I would have booked immediately.

You can fly from other cities also- like Mangalore for a marginal extra -just a 1000 INR extra

Now Air India has also reduced its price to match Indigo. Air India BLR-Mumbai-Mauritius is cheaper than Mumbai Mauritius! Fly more, pay less, all thanks to competition

Air Mauritius earlier had direct flight to BLR & Chennai- doesn't look like they have resumed it yet.

Unlike Seychelles which has dozens of islands, Mauritius is one large island with most attractions accessible via surface transport. Visa free for Indians as well. What are you thinking?

Delhi to Europe cheap tickets: March 2025: 33k INR return

There are some cheap tickets to Europe for March 2025 from Delhi. Similar fares are available from Mumbai as well.

Delhi Milan for 34 to 36k INR return. I would prefer Etihad for 1k extra as it includes food and hopefully some entertainment (some Etihad planes do not have entertainment)

Delhi Rome for 32-33k Return

 

Delhi Athens for 32k- you will fly Indigo till Instanbul and Turkish from IST to Athens.  Last year this time I had got 24k return ticket from Mumbai to Athens on Kuwait airways. This time not so lucky.

March is a boundary season- end of winter, beginning of summer. You might get some snow if lucky and crowd will still be less. 

Read: Pros and cons of visiting Europe in off season.

Same destination in April will cost 5k to 10k more.

If serious you can plan- maybe fly in to Prague and return from Athens. You have 3 months to plan for visa and other things.

Air India plane spotted in KLIA2

Air India is a full service airline and flies to KLIA 1 in Kuala Lumpur. Recently spotted an Air India plane in KLIA2, the low cost terminal primarily used by Air Asia and other LCCs.

Not sure why Air India plane flew into KLIA2- Maybe the air craft was temporarily exchanged with Air India express. Or is Air India cheating on Air India express going to KLIA2 without letting Air India express?

What do you think?

Indigo is most expensive airline I flew this year!

This year, 2024, I have taken 29 flights across 3 continents (Europe, Africa, Asia), 11 countries (India, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, Egypt, Kazhakstan, Greece, Romania, Albania, Malta, Italy) through 9 different airlines (Kuwait Air, Indigo, Fly Arystan, Air Asia, Singapore Airlines, Etihad, Agean, Ryanair, WizzAir).

Of all the flights I took, I tried to calculate which airline is the most expensive. The parameter I used to decide this is the cost of ticket price I paid divide by number of flying hours, to decide how much each of these airlines are costing me for 1 hour of flying time.

In this method, I find India's Indigo is the most expensive airline I flew this year, costing me upto 5000 INR per 1 hour of flying. Maybe Air India would have matched Indigo on this, just that I didn't have any flights with Air India in 2024.

Fly Arystan is the cheapest- but sadly that airline has very few flights and getting that 7400 return ticket is very difficult now. So it is a one off case, not very easy to get all the time.

Air Asia still stays one of the cheapest airlines to fly internationally- if you get lucky and can spot good deals, you will get tickets costing about 1200-1300 INR per hour of flying, which is a good deal under current circumstances.

Singapore Airlines was the most expensive ticket I bought this year- 34000 INR return Mumbai to Taipei. I could have visited Taipei on VietJet Air or Air Asia for about 27000 INR onwards. That extra 7000 goes for inflight meals, entertainment, amenities,baggage allowance (I didn't use) etc. The flight to Taipei was also very long, so on a per hour basis, Singapore airline ticket costed me just 1416 INR per hour, which is an amazing deal for a full service airline. (Last year's ticket to Busan was 30k and 2 hours extra flying, even cheaper.

Rest of the ticket details you can see in image below.

Most regional flights within Europe on EasyJet, RyanAir, WizzAir etc cost about 2000-3000 INR per hour of flying, if planned few months in advance, except some high demand tourist destinations like Santorini.

Indigo (or rather India's domestic flight tickets) are most expensive, costing as much as 5000 INR per hour of flying or more. Some destination like Gangtok costs 60k return from BLR, for a total of 6 hours of flying, costing 10000 INR per hour of flying.

Other thing about Indigo- it doesn't give any discount for early booking.

BLR-MRU return: Feb 2025 is 31k, but October 2025 is 70k!

Except a few high competition sections like Delhi Mumbai, BLR Mumbai, HYD Mumbai, most flights to Tier 2 cities cost a bomb in India, impacting domestic tourism and travel.

What do you think about this?

Air Asia Kochi Da Nang 2024 Experience

Flew Air Asia after an year. Previous trip was BLR-DMK in August 2023. Recent trip was Kochi to Da Nang via Kuala Lumpur.

Booking: I had to book the ticket on Cleartrip instead of Air Asia official website as Cleartrip was cheaper. Air Asia official website is lot pain now to hunt for cheapest flights. They don't show price for all days + all non Air Asia flights are also mixed up.

Inflight food: Air Asia is now advertising in flight food as "cheaper than airport". A bowl of Hyderabad Biriyani costs 19 Ringgit with Air Asia. Vegetable Biriyani inside KLIA 2 (Taste of India restaurant) costs 20 MYR but includes a papad, few side dishes and marginally more quantity. 

However crew didn't have stock of Hyd Biriyani on DAD-KUL Leg. They were serving vegetarian noodle as well, but this is not listed on the in flight menu. At WH Smith store inside KLIA2 this cup noodle costs MYR 6.

On time: Two of our flights were 30 minutes late- not a big issue.

Load factor: All flights were full. For DAD-KUL leg my friend got to check-in her cabin baggage for free as flight was full and cabin space was limited.

Air Asia operates about 3 flights daily between Kochi and Kuala Lumpur and 3 flights daily between Da Nang and Kuala Lumpur- so lots of flight options to chose from.

If not Air Asia your next best bet to reach Da Nang is VietJet Air which will connect you via Saigon.

Seat assignment: Got 1 window, 2 aisle and 1 middle seat for the 4 legs, as I chose not to pay for the seat.

Overall experience was standard. Good to fly with Air Asia again. Hopefully these return to their pre covid pricing soon. I had flown to Japan for 16k return. Now for 17k I could go only till Vietnam.

Air Asia new routes- Chennai & Kolkata to Phuket!

Air Asia Thailand has announced 5 new routes, 3 of which are to India

• Chennai to Phuket direct flight
• Kolkata to Phuket direct flight
• Hyd to Bangkok (DMK) flight
  

This will give more options to Indian flyers- can fly directly to Phuket instead of one stop via DMK or KUL or SIN. Indigo already has BLR to Phuket direct flight selling for 30 to 35k return.

Currently Air Asia round trip direct flight tickets are selling for 18k. Can get more cheaper if booked during their sales. I am hoping for around 12k.

Flying direct to Phuket also gives you an option to take a ferry to Krabi, instead of flying one stop to Krabi. You can also stay at Phi Phi island in between.

Read more on Air Asia official website

 

Above: Shrinidhi Hande in Phuket, sometime in 2028

Read more about Phuket: India to Phuket planning guide *

 

Reasons why Domestic airfare is so expensive!

Domestic flights within India are insanely expensive now. Just 1 hour flight between Mumbai-Mangaluru or Mangaluru-Hyd etc cost 11-12k return while we can fly all the way to South East Asia, Middle East for that kind of money on international carriers during their sale.

Why India's domestic flight tickets are getting so expensive?

Reason 01: No competition! Right now Air India group (Air India, Air India Express) and Indigo are the only players left in India's aviation market. GoAir is dead. Spicejet is operating too few flights with lots of delays and cancellations so customers are not preferring it, Vistara is killed by Air India and Vistara's loyal customers don't really like Air India but they don't have a choice. Akasa Air market share hasn't crossed 5% so not really effective. Smaller players like Fly91, Star Air, Alliance are too small to have any impact.

So with no competition left, Air India and Indigo are in no mood to reduce the price. Even if we're willing to book 1 year in advance, there is no drop in prices. Mumbai-Mangaluru, Mangaluru-Hyd etc cost 10-11k return at the minimum and go up to 14, 17, 20k as travel dates near. Flying from Kerala to J&K, North East is more expensive than flying to Europe or South East Asia.

September 2024 India Domestic Aviation Market Share:

• Indigo holds 63% 
• Air India Group (AI + Vistara + Air India Express) 29.2 %, 
• Akasa 4.4%
• Spicejet: 2%
• Rest: 1.4% (fly91, Star, Alliance Air etc)

Except Spicejet, other airlines had about 70% on time performance and load factor of about 86%. Despite high ticket prices, 86% of the seats are full. Main reason why airlines won't reduce fares. [Source: ET]

Reason 02: Govt also hasn't paid any attention and don't want to regulate the aviation market. Govt could possibly put an upper limit but they won't.

Reason 03: The main reason is people are still flying despite high fares. Many travel for business so company pays for their flight, they don't care about ticket price, few rich, upper middle class are flying despite high ticket price as they prefer convenience and luxury over alternatives like train. A few remaining seats are taken by other middle class people forced to take a domestic holiday because of visa issues or not being able to plan international trips well in advance when air fare is low.

Reason 04: UDAAN seems to be a failure. Govt promoted regional connectivity under UDAAN scheme but many smaller airports hardly have a flight or two per day and the ticket price is too expensive compared to alternate option like bus and train, so takers are few,

So as long as seats are getting filled up, airlines have no motive to drop prices. Only if flights go empty, there will be a price reduction.

Besides air ticket cost, cost of Airport taxi, cost of food inside airport also have increased.

Impact of high domestic airfares

- Loss for hotel, taxi, tourism industry- If domestic flights are expensive and international is cheaper, people will fly abroad, resulting in loss for domestic tourism industry. Hotels, taxi drivers, tour operators etc will have fewer customers

- Lesser international tourists- If international tourists sense that flying to Thailand, Indonesia etc are a lot cheaper and attractive than exploring India, they won't plan India tour

- Lesser revenue to airports. Airports charge on a per passenger basis. If more people book tickets, airports get higher revenue. If fewer people fly, airport revenue will drop

- Lesser tax money to Govt. If people fly abroad and spend their money there. govt gets lesser tax revenue, compared to someone spending within India.

- Cost of running a business goes up as employee travel expenses rise. Ultimately cost of product/service we buy will increase.

What can we do as flying public?

#1 Cut domestic flights and holidays, fly abroad when you spot a cheap deal. Only if seats go empty airlines wake up and reduce fare.

#2 Try overnight train instead of flights as the savings are huge. (Along with price difference you will also save on airport taxi, food purchase etc as these are cheaper in train)

#3 Always look for price from a nearby airport. Like flying out of Mangalore airport is very expensive but flights from Calicut, Kochi or Mumbai are a lot cheaper- so if you can take a train to these cities you can fly out for a lot less. A bit of inconvenience but savings are huge. 

#4 Try to plan your trips well in advance. Most international airlines run sales and sell tickets for lot cheap if you can commit to it 6-9 months in advance. Air Arabia, VietJet Air, Air Asia and many other airlines sell international tickets for a lot cheaper during their sale. Do your research, keep your preferences ready and book when you see a cheap fare.

Let me know your thoughts.

ANA Japan sale is back

ANA's Japan sale is back. Under 40k return ticket to Japan from Delhi, Mumbai etc, which is a good deal considering ANA is full service airline.

VietJet is back with 0 INR ticket that costs 15k return

 VietjetAir is back with its 0 INR ticket!

Though base fare is advertised as 0 INR or 0 USD, the one way ticket (For non stop flights between India & Vietnam) costs about 7300 INR after all taxes and charges and surcharges or return ticket will be little under 15k. 

Not so cheap but a reasonably good fare if you're thinking of visiting Vietnam. Even during Air Asia sale one stop flights to Vietnam will cost 15-17k. So 15k is good price if you can manage with 7kg baggage.

Vietjet Air website is not accepting mastercard issued by Indian banks. Payment options are limited. Trying to book the same on Indian OTAs will cost you 1500 more at 17k!

Vietnam visa will cost 25 USD

You can spend 3-4 days in Saigon and plan for Hanoi, Da Nang, Phu Quoc etc

Available for various dates in March, April 2025. You can plan well.

VietJetAir is low cost airline with basic service. My 2022 experience with VietJet Mumbai-Phu Quoc here. VietJet Air hasn't resumed flights from BLR and HYD yet, they operate from DEL, AMD, COK, BOM

Last minute deal- Kochi - Da Nang return for 17k still available

If you're thinking where to go this month end, return ticket to Vietnam (Da Nang) available for just 17k on Air Asia from Kochi. You can check for other dates and destinations as well and see if you get lucky.

Nov 1st is holiday in Karnataka, October 31st might be holiday for many due to Deepavali. With couple of days leave you can plan 1 week trip. Vietnam is not so expensive, so in about 50k or less per person you can plan a week's trip.

Note that above fare is cabin bag only. Food, checked bag will cost extra.

If you can't plan months in advance you should grab this opportunity and plan a short trip to Vietnam. Vietnam eVisa you can get in about 5-10 days for about 25 USD.

My detailed planning guide for Vietnam is available here.

Abu Dhabi Airport Terminal 3 is a ghost terminal?

Our hotel in Abu Dhabi was close to terminal 3. Surprisingly never saw any people or vehicle near the terminal, both during the day and night. Looks like it is not in use.

Watch this video. Tried finding more on net, but no concrete information available. Assume it is not operational yet or might be used very occasionally for private planes

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A post shared by Shrinidhi Hande (@enidhi)

Air Arabia Sale-22k return- Baku, Georgia, Armenia etc

Air Arabia is currently running a sale. One way ticket to various destinations such as Tblisi (Georgia), Yeravan (Armenia), Baku (Azerbaijan) etc are available for 11200 INR from Bengaluru, Kochi, Calicut, Mumbai, Delhi etc

Thus you can plan a return trip for about 23000 INR, or can also make a multi country plan- like fly to Tblisi, return from Baku or Armenia (local flights available for cheap)

The cheapest fare includes 10 kg cabin bag. Checked bag, meals extra. Or you can pay a bit more and select more flexible fare type.

Do check on Skyscanner or Air Arabia official website.

My brief review of Air Arabia here based on a single flight I took this week from AUH to Calicut. Looking forward to more trips in 2025 with them

Air Arabia- first impressions

I had my first flight with Air Arabia recently. Though ticket was booked with Etihad, one of the leg I opted for a flight operated by Air Arabia. Below are some key observations.

Air Arabia is a low cost airline. So like other LCCs, expect to pay for everything.

Because my ticket was booked on Etihad, I was entitled for 1 meal on Air Arabia flight. Air Arabia meal had good portion of rice and a curry, but nothing else. Only a bottle of water. Everything else, including coffee is for purchase.

Compared to Etihad, meals tray missed sweets, salad, bread etc. Plus Etihad gives blanket, pillow, no such option in Air Arabia.

Air Arabia has been in business for several years now- 20+ and operate a fairly vast network out of Sharjah, Abu Dabhi and few other hubs. Once in a while we might find good deals to Africa, Europe on Air Arabia from Calicut, Kochi or Mumbai.

Exit rows are chargeable, but there were no one there on our flight, so few passengers were asked to sit in exit row.

Air Arabia has a free inflight entertainment. We can watch movies etc on our mobile phone. However, movie collection is so old and poor, I closed it. No USB charging inside the plane.

Air Arabia inflight menu was good- they accept AED or USD or INR (at inflated rates). Lots of snacks, drinks and meals to chose from. Veg Biriyani was 25 AED, 1 small tender coconut water/ masala tea is 7 AED and so on.

Some items are priced 2.1 USD. This 0.1 USD will cause inconvenience. They could have kept it at 2 USD.

Air Arabia's PNR is also unique- 8 digit all numbers, unlike 6 alphanumeric PNRs used by other airlines.

Overall flight was on time, crew were nice and experience was fine. Air Arabia competes with FlyDubai, FlyNas and few other middle east budget carriers.

Summary: Good things: Nice planes, good food, reasonable price, fairly good network, inflight magazine, 10 KG cabin baggage and prices

Can be improved: content of inflight entertainment.

Note: there is Air Arabia sale going on. Return ticket to various destinations for under 24k!. Do not miss. I've booked few trips for 2025

Japan sale is ON! Less than 40k return!

 India to Japan return tickets are now available for less than 40k from many cities

Available from Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi etc, on ANA, VietJet, Singapore airline etc. ANA and SQ are full service airlines including food, entertainment, baggage while VietJet/Air Asia would charge extra.

ANA has direct flights from DEL and BOM to NRT. Other airlines can fly you to Haneda or Narita one stop from their hub.

Available for various dates- Nov 2024, March to May 2025 and more.

Watch this insta post:

Do check and book.

Indigo doesn't want you to book early!

A generic belief in aviation is that if you book early, you get to save a lot. With most airlines, if you can commit to a trip 6, 9 or 12 months in advance you usually get a much cheaper ticket compared to someone booking just 2 or 3 months in advance. However India's largest airline Indigo doesn't believe in this concept.

Let us take a look

Example 1: Mumbai to Baku (GYD, Azerbaijan)

Current date: 14 September 2024

BOM-GYD: 8th August to 18th August 2025, 11 months from now is 42000 INR but 15 days from now, Sep 30, Oct 9 2024 is just 40k!. No point booking 1 year in advance as there's no savings. Wait for cheaper deal closer to travel date.

Example 2: DEL-ALA (Almaty, Kazhakstan)

Current date: 14 September 2024

DEL-ALA, Aug 2025 is 26k return, October 2024 is just 25.5k return. Why book an year in advance?

 

Example 3: BOM-IST (Ishanbul)

Current date: 14 September 2024

BOM-IST: Aug 2025 is 42k, Sep/Oct 2024, 2 week from now is 41k

Let us check a domestic

Delhi-Mangaluru return ticket is 13.6k for Aug 2025, but 13k for Sep/Oct 2024!

 And on top it they do a jumla of saying "Filling fast" for a travel date 1 year from now

You've been warned

Kochi- Vietnam return for 17k!

Return tickets to Vietnam are available from 17k INR.

Kochi to Da Nang via Kuala Lumpur and few other destinations within Vietnam, available for 17k return on Air Asia, sold via OTAs like MMT and Cleartrip. Date- October end & November and more combinations.

Checked flights from few other cities- Chennai, BLR, Kolkata etc, not as cheap as Kochi

Because of cyclone Yagi I guess lots of people are cancelling their tickets and prices will drop. Should be fine by end of October, which is deemed good season.

Here is my India-Vietnam Guide

Air Seychelles cuts India flights

Air Seychelles had 2 or 3 weekly flight to Mumbai from Mahe. But now the airline has cut the frequency to only 1 flight per week.

I had a carefully selected Sunday evening return flight- now being asked to return on Friday night- costing me an entire weekend.

I am guessing airline has decided so due to poor ticket sales. Return flight to Seychelles were selling for 55k post covid, had dropped to 34k. Despite that maybe not too many people are keen to explore Seychelles. The African island nation doesn't have any hostels, everything is more expensive than Europe, so tourists don't have any strong motive to go there.

 Air Seychelles doesn't have any customer care in India. Need to dial international number or hope for email support.

Seychelles is visa free for Indians and it is the only advantage or motive to plan for Seychelles. Nice beaches are available in Bali, Maldives, Mauritius as well. The 30-40k INR flight ticket is at par with ticket to Europe, so people will weigh their options.

Let us see how things go. For 2025 Air Seychelles is selling tickets for 2 times a week flight to Mumbai- maybe they are checking how many tickets they can sell and might cancel one of the flights later.

Mumbai Europe return 24k for Nov 2024

 Cheap tickets available to Southern Europe for October-November 2024

Mumbai-Geneva 24k return

Mumbai Rome 26k return

November is a bit off season but souther Europe is still doable I think.

Air Kerala- New airline in the south

India will soon have another airline. (Fly91 from Goa was the latest addition). UAE based businessmen have planned to launch a regional carrier called Air Kerala. As per their official website airkerala.com, the airline has got some initial permissions from the Government to launch a carrier. However airline is yet to setup aircrafts, crew and decide on their destinations & pricing.

Air Kerala will be launched as a low cost carrier, offering economical tickets. Air Kerala seems to be interested in inducing ATR 72 aircrafts to start with- these single aisle, no middle seat aircrafts are good for short distance flights- Air Kerala will be able to fly to various regional destinations from its hub in Kochi- Lakshadweep, Calicut, Bengaluru, Chennai and so on.

Even within Kerala there are lots of potentials- many airport combinations are not served with direct flight. Such as

• Trivandrum-Kannur (500 kms)
• Trivandrum-Calicut (400 kms)
• Trivandrum Madurai (320 kms)
• Kochi-Mysuru
• Trivandrum-Mangaluru
• Trivandrum-Goa
• Kochi-Goa
• Calicut-Pune
  

Lots of people might prefer a short flight instead of several hours of road or train journey. So Air Kerala definitely has lots of potential. When they launch international flights, if flying via Kochi is lot cheaper, people may prefer it- like Mysuru-Blr-Dubai return costs 20k, but Mysuru-Kochi Dubai return costs 15k, then why not fly via Kochi?

Air Kerala also has plans to launch cheap flights to middle east but for that they should first fly a few years within India. If we can fly to Dubai, Sharjah, Bahrain, Muscat etc for a price cheaper than what costs to fly Kerala to Delhi, J&K, north east, then many tourists might prefer middle east over domestic destinations. Let us see.

Here's wishing good luck to the new airline Air Kerala.

Bengaluru Kuala Lumpur 13k return on Batik Air

 Bengaluru folks, cheap ticket to Kuala Lumpur available on Batik Air for March 2025. Plan well and save

Batik Air was full service airline unlike AirAsia, but now they also have started charging extra. Cheapest fare won't get you any food or checked bag. You can chose slightly more expensive fare type or pay extra.

Cheaper tickets also available to other destinations in Malaysia like Kota Kinabalu and Langkawi

I've flown Batik Air from Chennai to Bali and the service was good.

Available for various other dates as well, you've to check yourself.

Malaysia is visa free for Indians till end of 2024. Hopefully it extends into 2025

Read my earlier Malindo Air experience here

On each Air India flight, 2-3 passengers lose their checked bag!

Recently a report listed Air India as the world's worst airline when it comes to losing passenger's checked in bags. Air India loses as many as 33000+ bags every month across its network.

I was trying to calculate how many flights Air India operates per day. This information is NOT readily available online, so I had to try to calculate myself: Below are my assessment

Air India has about 145 planes, serves 37 international and 44 domestic destinations. Around 60 wide body planes and rest are narrow body.

International destinations are served at max 1 flight per day, often only 3-4 days a week

Domestic flights- 2 hour flight, 1-2 hours at the airport (taxi, wait for boarding/de-boarding, fuel, baggage & food loading/unloading, maintenance)- so 4 hours per flight means an aircraft can do max 6 flights per day. I don't think every aircraft operates 24 hours a day- there will be maintenance work at night, some aircrafts will be out of service, there will be delays etc. So let us assume 4 flights per day for each aircraft- about 80+ planes making 4 flights per day= 320 flights per day, 60 wide body planes making average 2 flights per day= 120 flights, total of 440 flights per day

Air India is losing 33000+ bags in a month or 1100 bags per day.  With 440 flights per day, this comes to 2.5 bags per flight. In other words, on every flight, 2 to 3 Air India passengers are likely to lose their checked baggage!

Image credit: This tweet

With an average 200 passengers per plane, this comes to about 1%. Above stat puts probability of losing your bag in an Air India flight at 2%

Sad part is Airline doesn't have any SOP when a customer reports that his/her bag is lost. They can't track it, they can't give a reasonable timeline when it will be delivered, no compensation, no courtesy to paying passengers.

Check this tweet for the plight of an affected passenger:

https://x.com/thekaipullai/status/1807985384380399784

Kochi to Da Nang, Vietnam- 15k return, Aug 2024

Cheap tickets are available for Vietnam on VietJet Air

• COK-DAD, 15-16k return 
• BOM-DAD, 17-18k return

August is off season for Vietnam. Expect fair bit of rain- this is the main reason why tickets are cheap.

You can check for other destinations .

Vietjet is decent low cost airline based on Vietnam and they are operating flights to India since past 2 years. I flew to Phu Quoc with them in 2022 and here is my experience

WizzAir India launch: expectations, initial thoughts

WizzAir is a popular low cost airline in Europe. I've flown this airline from Athens to Budapest in 2023, Athens to Tirana in 2024.

WizzAir flies to Middle East from Europe, so we do get cheap flights to Athens and Budapest from Abu Dabhi. It was possible to fly to Europe from India for about 22000 INR return via AUH. But Wizzair don't have any codeshare with airlines operating to India so we need to clear immigration in AUH, check in bags again etc, adding to cost, time, effort and risk of delay, making the whole proposition not very practical.

Now the news is WizzAir is planning direct flights from India to Europe from 2025, using A321 XLRs.

More details are yet to emerge- which city to which city, price etc. The news says one way fare will be under 200 Euros or 18000 INR, but I feel that is not viable. If we research and plan in advance, return ticket to Europe under 40000 INR is not a difficult thing. I'd flows Mumbai Athens for 24000 INR this year (Kuwait Air), Mumbai Paris for 38000 INR last year (Lufthansa-Swiss Air). We often spot deals around 30-35k easily between Europe and India.

If WizzAir needs to be tempting, they should target a return ticket under 25000 INR. WizzAir is not full service- food and checked bag cost extra.

Let us see from which city to which city WizzAir launch their flights and at what price. A321 XLR can fly about 7400 kms- not enough for BLR-UK but good enough for BLR-Budapest, BLR-Athens etc. Of course they can't plan till the last mile, as some buffer will be needed to fly to alternate airport, range drops if there is lots of weight (passenger+bag) etc.

I feel Mumbai- Athens, AMD-Budapest might be good start. WizzAir has good base in Athens, Budapest etc and many Indian cities do not have direct flight to these airports from India.

Let us see.

Thanks Karthik Kannan for the tip off.

Related: My first experience with WizzAirMy first experience with WizzAir