Tan Kin Lian's Blog: Booking a flight

Saturday, April 09, 2011

Booking a flight

I wanted to book a flight to Vancouver for the last week of May. I searched Singapore Airlines and was surprised to find an economy ticket cost over $5,000. I asked my travel agent to source for a budget ticket.

I decided to search Google for air tickets from Singapore to Vancouver (to get a benchmark to compare the price sourced by my travel agent). I found a link to sg.webjet.com.sg. It was easy to navigate. It showed the available airlines and the travelling time. Here are the search results.

Several airlines offered a return economy ticket from $1,600 to $2,000, before the processing fee of 6% payable to Webjet. It also showed the travel time of the flights, which ranged from 20 to 32 hours per trip.

With this information, my preference is for Cathay Airways due to its wide choice (in case of last minute change of schedule), short travelling time (around 20 hours) and acceptable price (around $2,200, inclusive of the fee payable to Webjet). This price is less than half of Singapore Airlines.

I find the presentation by Webjet to be excellent. It is better than Zuji (which I used previously).

Tan Kin Lian

4 comments:

yujuan said...: All Singaporean avid travellers know for donkey decades that we are discriminated group on our own National Airlines. So never travel by SIA, foreigners booking SIA from abroad pay less fare tickets.
Strange we have a anti local mentality here in Singapore. Many, if not all local attractions do not have preferential local rates for admission, just check out the admission tickets into Sentosa Island, a family of four has to spend some hundreds dollars to see all attractions, you go in and pay and pay through your nose. So who bothers to go to the Island, and psychologically also think admission rates of the Zoo, or Bird Park or the museums are just as expensive.
We have not gone to Sentosa, Zoo and bird park for 15 to 20 years.
Not surprising our Govt also follow the trend and favours foreigners over the locals in their policies. Can't resist havung a dig at the Authorities, as this trend is becoming more and more ridiculous.; April 09, 2011 2:14 PM
Singapore's 5 Minute Investment Diary said...: I've been told similar stories by well travelled friends.

Mr Tan Kin Lian may want to confirm when he is in Vancouver.

If theory is true;
an SIA return ticket: Vancouver-Singapore-Vancouver

should be cheaper than;
Singapore-Vancouver-Singapore; April 09, 2011 5:59 PM
symmetrix said...: I have not flown on SIA for the last 20 yrs. Their prices are generally higher for flights originating from sg. One reason for SIA's pricing policy could be that it considers sg a 1st world country. But there may be other 1st world countries that charge cheaper for their locals.

The situation was different in the 1960s and 1970s, just after separation. It was my preferred airline with low fares and super service. Now that the competition has caught up, and exceeded in many areas, SIA has lost some of its shine.

I am now a fan of EK for European or Aus flts. Good price, good service and generally short connection times.; April 09, 2011 6:04 PM
Vincent Sear said...: Cathay Pacific is usually best for Vancouver because of their popular HK-Vancouver connection. S$5,000 for that flight on economy class is ridiculous. Well, it's even ridiculous on first class.

32 hours for that flight is even more ridiculous. Fly to London first, then fly to Vancouver?

I'm not trying sarcasm here but for the price and time, these are riduculous quotes. I've been a frequent traveler to North America. Frequent enough to have claimed some free tickets on mileage programs now and then.

The only reason I can think of why they do this is overbooking and overcharching on price elasticity. For those unfamiliar with economic terms, price elasticity is a diplomatic term for extortionate pricing. When you need it and must have it, they'll charge however high they think you can afford it.; April 10, 2011 9:53 PM