Nok Air too suspends flights to Bangalore

Nok Air too suspends flights to Bangalore
Urvashi Jha BANGALORE


THAI low-cost carrier Nok Air, which positioned itself as a ‘shoppers airline,’ is suspending its operations to Bangalore. The heavy discounts on offer for brands like Bebe, Replay, Bossini and Espirit at malls in Bangkok have failed to charm passengers from the city.The airline is withdrawing its operations on the Bangalore-Bangkok route this month with its last flight operating on November 23, 2007.
Nok Air started operations in India by launching daily Bangalore-Bangkok flight in June this year. Bangalore was also the first international destination for Nok Air, which operates to 11 destinations in Thailand. After Bangalore, the airline had planned to launch daily flights from Hyderabad, Chennai and Delhi to Bangkok early next year.
This is the second low cost carrier flying to South East Asia that will suspend its operations to the city . Early this year, JetStar Asia withdrew its five flights per week service on the Bangalore-Singapore sector citing low passenger load factor.
According to industry sources like JetStar Asia, Nok Air too found the route unviable. Having a limited fleet of eight aircraft, Nok Air is looking at operating on other lucrative routes in South East Asia such as Vietnam. The airline has recently added Hanoi on its air map. However, Rajiv Bhatia, GM (India) of Nok Air says, “we were doing very well on the Bangalore-Bangkok route. We are only withdrawing our operations on this route temporarily owing to the non-availability of aircraft. We were going to get five Boeing aircraft on lease. India is definitely on our radar and we still want to fly to Delhi , Hyderabad and Chennai.” Mr Bhatia, however, declined to comment on the timeline of re-entry into India. All the passengers who have been booked on the flight after November 23 will be transferred to Thai Airways.
But, the travel industry has a different story to tell. According to sources, Nok Air passenger load factor fell to 40%. “In India, international low cost carriers take more time to turn profitable, but they withdraw their operations soon. Also the return fare (including taxes) difference between Nok Air and full serviced carrier such as Thai Airways is around Rs 3,000-4,000. So Indian passengers prefer a full serviced carrier rather than paying for food and blankets on Nok Air. Indian customers want fantastic value if they travel low cost,” says a travel agent.
Another factor that went against Nok Air on this route was the poor on-ward connectivity to other destinations in South East Asia. Full service carriers such as Thai, Singapore Airlines, Malaysia Airlines and Sri Lankan score over Nok Air with better connectivity to destinations beyond Thailand. They also offer several value holiday packages and competitive air fares regularly.