KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 27): AirAsia Group Bhd said its fares for one-way flights from Peninsular Malaysia to Sarawak had been lowered from around RM1,000 to below RM200, following additional scheduled weekly flights from the former to the latter destination for a limited period of time.
In a statement on Saturday (Nov 27) to address concerns expressed on social media that the airline is charging high fares for flights between Peninsular Malaysia and Sarawak for the upcoming holiday season, AirAsia said there will be an additional 42 weekly flights from the peninsula to the state from Dec 4, 2021 to Jan 5, 2022.
“AirAsia has been continuously engaging the Ministry of Transport Sarawak (MOTS) and submitted applications to permanently increase its scheduled flight frequencies from Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah to Sarawak on several occasions since early this year, including the latest request submitted last week which included the operation of extra flights for the upcoming holiday season, Christmas and Chinese New Year," it said.
The airline said it received confirmation for the additional 42 slated weekly flights from the MOTS and the Sarawak State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) on Saturday.
“This brought the fares down from around RM1,000 one way to below RM200 for a Kuala Lumpur-to-Kuching flight and these were very quickly snapped up,” it added.
AirAsia Malaysia chief executive officer (CEO) Riad Asmat said AirAsia’s pricing model is similar to other airlines worldwide, whereby it is based on supply and demand.
“In abiding with the limited flight frequencies imposed by the SDMC resulting in reduced supply of flight seats, AirAsia’s demand-based dynamic pricing mechanism has inevitably derived prices seen as unfavourable to buyers at this time.
“It must be remembered that this is also the same mechanism that we used to offer guests promotional fares from as low as RM99 one way earlier in October.
“Many guests were able to grab our low fares when we ran a special promotion at the end of October with flights from Kuala Lumpur to Sarawak selling from as low as RM99 one way. We comprehend that demand is there but at the moment we are unable to meet it until more flight approvals are given,” he added.
Riad noted that pre-Covid-19, AirAsia used to fly over 300 weekly flights to Sarawak, connecting Kuching, Sibu, Miri and Bintulu to Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Johor Bahru, Kota Baru, Kota Kinabalu and various other destinations in Malaysia.
“Just for Kuala Lumpur-Kuching alone, we used to fly between 12 and 15 flights daily on this hugely popular route before Covid-19, but with the latest approval today, AirAsia will be flying five daily flights between Kuala Lumpur and Kuching, which is a 67% reduction in our capacity due to the restrictions by the SDMC,” he said.
Riad said while AirAsia remains committed to providing affordable fares and value for money, underscored by its mantra of “Now everyone can fly”, the CEO, however, added that the inability to scale up its supply to meet demand due to flight restrictions had hampered the airline's ability to offer lower, affordable fares.
Thus, AirAsia said that it is appealing to the MOTS and SDMC to also approve its request for extra Chinese New Year flights and to remove frequency restrictions on all approved flights entirely to enable the airline to better manage cost efficiency and lower fares for passengers.
Source: AirAsia