Same day return fares from Air India offer pretty good value

Air India has launched Day Return fares on flights between select city pairs, for a fixed price. Naturally, the fares are valid for travel between the specified cities, for same day return, between today (25 July 2016) and 30 September 2016. Clearly this is an attempt to scrape bottom barrel in the fiscal Q2, which is the weakest period for commercial aviation in India. That said, this could be quite useful for business travelers who prefer same day returns.


Tickets cost a flat price of 
  • Rs 10,000 for the round trip in economy class, and Rs 25,000 in business class, for flights exceeding 700 miles and
  • Rs 5,000 for round trip in economy, and Rs 12,500 in business class, for flights less than 700 miles. 

You can access the offer and related T&Cs here. The following city pairs, which have scheduled same-day return flights, are eligible for this offer:


The economy class flights can also be upgraded to business class on Air India's Get Upfront offer.

The economy class fares under the same day return offer are under booking class (RBD) "G" which earns 50% of the distance in miles, while business class is in "Z" fare bucket which earns 110% miles.


Analysis

Except for economy class tickets in the longer flight segment categories (ie those over 700 miles), I find the other fares extremely competitive. For instance, here's economy class pricing on BOM-DEL (India's densest sector) and MAA-DEL (the longest sector in this offer) routes, for August 2016:



On BOM-DEL, AI's fare doesn't feature even once in all of August 2016, as the lowest fare for the day. On MAA-DEL, it does feature on two days in August 2016.

However, the scene is quite different on some of the other sectors in economy. For instance, on MAA-BOM, AI's fares are the lowest on almost all days of the month.


In business class, AI's deals clearly trump all other airlines, on pretty much all the routes. Here are some examples.

Delhi-Mumbai in business class

Chennai-Mumbai in business class

Chennai-Delhi in business class

Conclusion

This seems to be an excellent deal for business class travel on most routes on offer, and for economy class for some of the routes (if they work for you). I'm not sure how many seats AI will sell on account of just this offer, but it is a pretty good deal, for what it is worth.

Readers: What do you think of these prices? Would you fly Air India on these sectors at these fares? Let us know in the comments below.

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