Airfares for Tet Quy Mao are twice as expensive as last year.
Not only the golden route Ho Chi Minh City - Hanoi, ticket prices for other routes from the South have also increased sharply, some routes cost up to nearly ten million VND round trip.
According to a survey ofVnExpress, October 25 - 3 months before Lunar New Year, airfares from the South to the North and Central regions during the Lunar New Year all increased sharply.
On the golden route Ho Chi Minh City - Hanoi, the cheapest round-trip ticket during peak season, departing on January 19 (28th of Lunar New Year) and returning on January 26 (5th of Lunar New Year) is from 5.5 million VND. Vietravel Airlines tickets are more expensive, from 6.2 million VND. These prices include taxes and fees but do not include checked baggage.
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Tourists visiting Nha Trang. Photo: Document |
Even more expensive are tickets from Bamboo Airways, Pacific Airlines, and Vietnam Airlines. Ticket prices for this route on Bamboo Airways start from VND6.9 million, Pacific Airlines and Vietnam Airlines from VND7.1 million. If you fly on January 14 (December 23) and return on January 26 (the 5th day of Tet), the round-trip ticket price remains the same as the peak period above.
Compared to the Lunar New Year, the ticket price for this route has doubled this year. Earlier this year, more than half a month before Tet, customers could buy round-trip tickets from Ho Chi Minh City to Hanoi during peak season for just over VND2.5 million from Vietjet, VND2.8 million from Vietravel Airlines. Bamboo Airways and Airlines tickets are also only from VND3.5 million and VND4 million.
This year, the prices of niche flights from Ho Chi Minh City to the Northern and Central provinces are even more expensive. The cheapest round-trip ticket for the Ho Chi Minh City - Thanh Hoa route departing on January 19 and returning on January 26 on Vietjet is from 7 million VND, while the cheapest ticket on Pacific Airlines is from 7.1 million VND.
If flying with Vietnam Airlines, passengers will have to spend from 9 million VND. For the routes from Ho Chi Minh City to Da Nang, Vinh..., the lowest round-trip fares are 4.6 million VND and 7 million VND respectively.
Due to the high ticket prices this year, many customers are having to consider changing their flight plans to get the most reasonable price. Ms. Minh Trang, who works in the media field in Ho Chi Minh City, said she had to change her flight plans to return home for the upcoming Tet holiday because the ticket prices were too high.
According to a representative of Vietnam Airlines, from the time of opening ticket sales for Tet on August 15 to October 20, the number of customers booking for Tet 2023 increased by 23% compared to the same period of the lunar calendar for Tet 2020 (pre-pandemic period) and mainly chose to fly from December 20 to January 9.
The routes with a large number of ticket buyers are Hanoi - Ho Chi Minh City, Ho Chi Minh City - Da Nang, Ho Chi Minh City - Hai Phong, Vinh, Thanh Hoa, Hue. Tourists are concentrated in Da Nang, Cam Ranh, Phu Quoc and have purchased tickets quite early compared to 2020 and tend to take advantage of the early flights (one-way flights are crowded, the return flight may be "empty" to avoid peak times).
From January 6 to February 5, 2023 (ie December 15 to January 15), Bamboo Airways plans to increase capacity by 15-20%, providing more than 1 million seats across the entire flight network and will increase the number if conditions permit. In addition, the airline has also planned to increase night flights during peak periods./.
