Asian air travellers sacrifice comforts for cheap fares
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Many travellers in the Asia Pacific region are happy to forego in-flight comforts, such as movies and meals, for the sake of a cheap fare, a major new study has found.
According to the results of Expedia‘s Low Cost Carrier (LCC) Airline Index for Asia Pacific, 56% of the region’s travellers said they didn’t need in-flight entertainment, while almost half said they do not require meals (49%) or pillows and blankets (48%), if it meant saving money on the airfare.
But carry-on baggage (17%), legroom (21%) and free checked baggage (22%) were the items Asia Pacific travellers said they were least likely to compromise on.
Interestingly, almost one-in-five (19%) respondents said they would be willing to sacrifice “bathroom privileges”.
On the whole, 76% of Asia Pacific travellers said they would be willing to accept a slightly lower level of customer service from an airline in order to save money. Travellers in Thailand were most agreeable to this trade-off (93%), followed by those in Hong Kong (91%). Passengers in the Philippines (56%) and India (59%) were least likely to accept this.
And the duration of the flight is also important for Asia Pacific travellers when deciding whether to fly low-cost or full-service. More than a third of those surveyed said they would consider an LCC for a flight up to three hours, but this dropped to 23% for flights of five hours and just 7% for a flight up to eight hours.
And the rise of LCCs appears to be benefiting the hotel sector. Almost half (46%) of respondents said that when they book a flight on an LCC they spend more money on a hotel. This is particularly true of travellers from Taiwan (71%) and Thailand (62%). Across Asia Pacific, Malaysian travellers were the most likely to use LCCs.
Supply of low-cost air seats the Asia Pacific region is expected to increase by 9.5% in 2015.
The Expedia study polled approximately 3,200 travellers in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Taiwan.
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