The government needs to ensure that once flights resume, airlines don’t underprice their tickets to attract customers and kill revenues of aviation industry or overprice them to earn enough profits to sustain the losses suffered. That is why the government has put an upper cap and lower cap on the base prices of flights. All the flight tickets will be priced between Rs 2,000 and Rs 18,600. There are a total of seven price bands introduced by the government. The price bands of the flights have been decided on the basis of the kind of time it will be on air.
Price Bands Set for the Pricing of the Flight Tickets
There are a total of seven price bands introduced by the government. The first one is for planes which are in the air for 40 minutes or lesser; they will be capped between Rs 2,000 and Rs 6,000. The second price band is for planes whose duration is between 40 and 60 minutes, they will be capped between Rs 2,500 and Rs 7,500. For flights in the air between 60 and 90 minutes, they will be capped between Rs 3,000 and Rs 9,000. Flights that are in the air for a duration between 90 and 120 minutes, they will be capped between Rs 3,500 and Rs 10,000. Every flight between 120 and 150 minutes will be capped between Rs 4,500 and Rs 13,000. For flights in the air between 150 and 180 minutes, they will be capped between Rs 5,500 and Rs 15,700. Lastly, the most expensive price band which is for flights in the air between 180 and 210 minutes, they will be capped between Rs 6,500 and Rs 18,600.
New SOP Released by Airports Authority of India
The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has released a standard operating procedure for the passengers travelling once the flights resume. The SOP states that a passenger must come to the airport at least two hours before their scheduled flight. With that, they must be wearing all the mandatory safety gears and download the Aarogya Setu app on their devices. Passengers are not allowed to carry more than one check-in baggage and everyone must follow the social distancing norms for the airports and aircraft.
