Airline in $99 fares war to Bali

Editors Note: A new air fare war with air Asia probably means even more poor service from form them. My personal experience flying three times with them was two times was late an average of two hours. If you don't mind hanging around airports take advantage of their low fares.

GEOFFREY THOMAS AVIATION EDITOR, The West Australian May 17, 2010, 4:50 am

AIRASIA X WANTS YOU TO NAME ITS PLANES Name an aircraft to win free flights and have your name immortalised in aviation history X-TERMINATOR of full price airfares AirAsia X wants wordsmiths from every corner of the globe to put on their thinking caps and help them name their planes. The rapidly expanding budget airline currently operates three aircraft and has a further 23 A330s and one A340s on order. It is calling on the global community to come up with some X-treme names as part of a naming competition for their new aircraft. Candidates who submit names chosen by AirAsia X receive free return airfares to anywhere on the AirAsia X network, which now includes Stansted London as well as Gold Coast, Perth, Melbourne and Hangzhou routes. Winning wordsmiths will have their personal names immortalised on the aircraft - inside the body and outside the cabin. AirAsia X CEO Azran Osman-Rani wants AirAsia X aircraft names to reflect the airline's 'X' factor. "In many ways, the X in AirAsia X is a perfect symbol depicting, in a singular, powerfully emotive letter, the x-tremely challenging context, x-citing product and x-traordinary team that's made it possible for so many to travel to see x-otic faraway destinations never dreamt possible before," he said on his online blog. "X is about extremes. Blazing new paths É X is different. X is in your face. X is an attitude, a lifestyle." AirAsia X this year expects to take delivery of three new A330s and staff have put forward Xploration, Xpedition and Xcursion as possible names for the aircraft. The airline's first two A330's were called Xuberance and Xhileration, while the plane that services the Kuala Lumpur to London route is called Xcalibur. Many aircraft spotters and enthusiasts will already know the airline's official call-sign is Xanadu. Entries can be submitted at http://blog.airasia.com/index.php/xanadu-calling-name-a-plane-and-get-your

AirAsia / Supplied ©

The AirAsia group is due to launch a new airfare war to Asia tomorrow with one-way fares expected to be just $99 or less to Bali and Kuala Lumpur.

It is understood there will be several million seats available Asia-wide for travel later this year and in 2011 to all the group's 65 destinations.

Previous sales by AirAsia have sold out in hours and the airline expects the seats to be snapped up.

After AirAsia started offering flights from Perth to Kuala Lumpur in late 2008 air travel to Kuala Lumpur leapt by 38 per cent in 2009, and is up another 34 per cent this year.

The airline started Bali services from Perth in 2009 and air travel to Bali has skyrocketed - climbing 46 per cent last year, while early figures point to another 50 per cent increase this year.

AirAsia will increase its Bali services to three times daily from June 1 and Kuala Lumpur to twice a day from August 1.

Last month, AirAsia chief executive Tony Fernandes promised West Australians "more flights and more bargains".

"Unlike other airlines we don't put fares up when our planes are full, we add more flights," Mr Fernandes said.

And unlike other airlines that were haemorrhaging red ink last year as passengers stayed away, AirAsia recorded a $183 million net profit with a 24 per cent growth in passengers to 22.7 million, making it the fastest-growing and most successful airline in the Asia-Pacific region.

The airline has 82 aircraft making 627 flights a day on 136 routes to 18 countries throughout Asia, Australia and India.

Those numbers are more extraordinary given that seven years ago the airline had just two aircraft and six routes and founder Mr Fernandes rarely, if ever, received an audience with regulators or politicians, let alone a cup of coffee from a banker.
Now the red carpet is there wherever he goes as airports build new terminals to accommodate his airline's expansion and politicians scramble to be seen at the airline's ever increasing occasions of ordering more aircraft or making new route announcements.