Airlines fail to attract passengers despite lucrative discounts

Airlines in Bangladesh have failed to attract passengers this Eid despite offering lucrative discounts.

According to industry insiders, air tickets often get sold out at least 15 days before Eid-UL-Fitr and Eid-Ul-Adha. But most of the tickets are still unsold this time around. Although prominent airlines like US-Bangla and Novoair offered discount prices and other offers as an attempt to attract passengers, the situation is yet to be changed.

Around 40 thousand people purchased air ticket last year during Eid season.  But this year, the number of people booking tickets are even less than half of the previous years so far.

The public relation officer of US-Bangla Md Kamrul Islam confirmed the news to The Business Post.

He said, “We generally have huge demands of ticket at Jashore, Syedpur and Barishal routes before Eid. But this time, most of the seats in all the classes are empty so far. Moreover, the number of flights have also been reduced due to the pandemic.”

The aviation industry is already under deep water since the worldwide travel ban began amid the coronavirus pandemic.

All domestic and state-run airlines have reportedly suffered a loss of Tk 1,361 crore over the months of March and April following the suspension of all flights on both domestic and international routes.

As the flight operation remained suspended on all the routes due to precarious coronavirus situation, Biman Bangladesh Airlines has counted a loss of Tk 939 crore while US-Bangla Airlines Tk 250 crore, Novoair Tk 32 crore and Regent Air Tk 140 crore till March-April .

But the situation didn’t change much since the travel restrictions eased down since June 1. Bangladesh Biman was forced to pause their operations due to a shortage of passengers. But they have decided to resume their flights at the Chattogram, Syedpur and Sylhet routes for the upcoming Eid from Saturday.

Tahera Khandakar Ahmed, the additional director(PR) of Bangladesh Biman confirmed the news.