Spicejet slashes prices to boost sales; but passengers have to pay Rs 2900 as tax

Come February, you may fly to New Delhi at Rs 0.99, but conditions apply.

Airlines had already cut down the number of trips following a dip in the number of passengers, and are expecting even less traffic in the coming months. The slash in prices is to boost ticket sales.

While Spice Jet is offering tickets at Rs 0.99, Air Deccan and IndiGo has priced the air fare at Re 1 ticket. In fact, SpiceJet also has a Rs.0 ticket scheme.u00a0 However, the offer is available only for specific flights on certain days. "Such offers are subject to availability of seats," said an official in SpiceJet. "After a certain number of seats are booked in each flight, the rest of seats will be booked under normal fares. Not every flight everyday will have the offer," he added.u00a0

The fares are in fact cheaper than the minimum BMTC bus tickets priced at Rs 5, and may remain so for the next three months.

Along with taxes the tickets would cost around Rs. 2,900 against the normal fares that costs between Rs 5,000 to Rs 8,000.

Agents' woes

Though such offers are good news for air travellers, agents are upset. Agents get paid about five per cent as commission; they now stand to make less than five paise per ticket. "Airlines do it to recover themselves in market at the cost of our services. We get less than five paise, which will not support even cost of printing tickets by us," B A Amarnathan, of Matha Air Travels said.