Gulf Travel Monitor KM SPECIAL Is Oman Air Virtually Taking Malayali Passengers for a Ride?
Dubai-Muscat -Is the Kerala community in Oman taken for aride by Oman Air? KM learns that the Airline is following a step motherly treatment towards the Kerala bound Malayali passengers by adopting a very high airfare compared to the rate charged from another adjacent destination. The charges are on the higher side for Keralites in Oman, who in fact, travel 40 minutes less than the passengers from Dubai who pay at least 25 per cent less than them.
Both the passengers are travelling in the same flight and get the same privileges While a Muscat Malayali pays a whopping RO 220 for a return ticket to Muscat-Kochi/Thiruvananthapuram, another passenger who boards the same plane from Dubai pay just Dhs. 1400 (equvalent to RO 140). Why the Keralites in Oman are charged RO 80 extra for travelling forty minutes less than the other passengers who board from Dubai? The Bombay fare from Dubai and Muscat too is equally perplexing. RO 150 for Bombay-Muscat-Bombay, while Dubai-Muscat-Bombay is just Dhs. 1000 - a difference of Dhs. 500!
What makes the airline treat passengers from Dubai who fly additional 40 minutes from Dubai to Muscat, as a pampered lot? For a single ticket from Dubai to Trivandrum/Kochi, Oman Air takes only Dhs 800, where as the same airline charges RO 140 from a Muscat Malayali. While the difference between Bombay and South Indian ticket fare is just 400 Dhs in the UAE, the gap widens to RO 80 in case of Muscat Malayalis. Bombay-Muscat return fare is RO 150 and for South India it is RO 220. The only difference is that the passengers from Dubai spend one hour in Muscat for boarding passengers from here.
This is just another example of the perverted airfare structure followed by varius airlines. Ordinary passengers are fleezed always. Everybody - the social club leaders and associations, promised that more airlines and increased competition to Kochi International Airport would bring down the airfare! But is it the way that we can expect the market to develop?
Air India Oman Air in controversy Consolidation -selling bulk ticket to a single agent rampant in India Thiruvananthapuram - September 2, 2002.Oman Air and Air India officials are in the eye of a controversy surrounding a dubious decision by the airline to sell the entire tickets of a special Thiruvananthapuram-Muscat flight to just one travel agent that raised strong objection from other travel agents and leading travel trade associations. Representatives of the travel trade in Kerala have demanded an investigation by the Central Buraue of Investigation into the deal that benefited only one travel agent -viz. Akbar Travels, owned by an influential business group. Various travel agents have questioned what they termed 'a dubious deal between Oman Air and Akbar Travels' to sell the tickets of a special Thiruvananthapuram-Muscat (flight No WY 2812), violating the prevailing market practice. It is alleged that the deal involving "vastha" has the tacit approval of Air India and Indian civil aviation officials. More
