So Why Is It Cheaper To Fly London Bangkok?

[Ricardo]

There has been some price-competition, as each new Gulf-based airline has tried to build-up its volumes, first Emirates then Etihad & Qatar appeared to do this. Then new-entries Jet-Airways & Kingfisher. But having got reasonable loads, with good-quality service & modern-aircraft at lower-prices, they now have raised their prices to generate more profit.

So who might be next, to buy volume with lower prices, Oman Air (when they have enough planes) or EgyptAir perhaps (their own website always seems a bit cheaper than the search-engine sites), and there's always Aeroflot !

As always you'll have to search & search, Thank-God for the internet making this easier (!), and when you spot a fleeting good-offer on vaguely-acceptable dates, jump-in and grab it ! Which is how I recently got 2 adults/1-child BKK-LHR-BKK, departing mid-June and returning late-July, for B76,080 all-in with EgyptAir (on their own website), but it's gone now.

I recognised that B25,360 was a relatively-good price, and grabbed it quickly !

Edited January 16, 2011 by Ricardo

[electrozebra]

Agree, look for the bargains on the internet.

Twice recently I found 1 way BKK - Stanstead for under £280 in February.

Taxes were abt £99 for LHR and £14 for Stanstead. That is a big differece also.

OK, no trains from Stanstead, but the regular bus service is £2 non-stop to Kings Cross and takes abt 1 hour 30 minutes.. I, like many others automatically think of LHR or MAN when flying to the UK until I started using price comparison sites and listing London ALL airports.

Supply and demand have to be factors too as others have said and a decent free market economy in the West.

Bear in mind the school holidays. Not only UK ones but European ones too. April being a terrible month as we have Easter and that royal wedding.

I recall European summer hols end a week or so later than UK ones do but again the internet is your friend and you can soon list all the holidays and then avoid those months. Whereas with Thailand the prices seem the same all year round.

[inthepink]

Who said anything about distance? I was talking about the flight taking more time because of headwinds.

As far as the information about the headwinds being incorrect, that is why I mentioned that I read it somewhere on the Internet and asked a question about it. It seemed to make sense, but I was not sure if it were true.

What you are completely overlooking is the fact that whether you start in Bangkok or you start in London you are going to be flying both ways so how can headwinds make the slightest difference to the cost of a return ticket??

[bangon04]

Agree, look for the bargains on the internet.

Twice recently I found 1 way BKK - Stanstead for under £280 in February.

Taxes were abt £99 for LHR and £14 for Stanstead. That is a big differece also.

OK, no trains from Stanstead, but the regular bus service is £2 non-stop to Kings Cross and takes abt 1 hour 30 minutes.. I, like many others automatically think of LHR or MAN when flying to the UK until I started using price comparison sites and listing London ALL airports.

Stansted Express direct to Liverpool Street. 45 mins. 20 quid single on the day. Cheaper if booked in advance.

[Ulysses G.]

Who said anything about distance? I was talking about the flight taking more time because of headwinds.

As far as the information about the headwinds being incorrect, that is why I mentioned that I read it somewhere on the Internet and asked a question about it. It seemed to make sense, but I was not sure if it were true.

What you are completely overlooking is the fact that whether you start in Bangkok or you start in London you are going to be flying both ways so how can headwinds make the slightest difference to the cost of a return ticket??

Because when you are flying against headwinds it takes longer than when you are flying with them, so fuel prices would be higher.

[madjbs]

It has nothing to do with headwinds. People are talking about return tickets (prices for singles are almost the same anyhow) which means that the amount of time flying against a headwind will be the same whichever end you are starting from.

[cdnvic]

Demand. June is low season in Thailand and high season in UK.

euhhh - therefore it should be the other way around ?

No, when it's low season in Thailand and high season in the UK there's more demand for flights to the UK and less demand for flights to Thailand. In such a case the fares should be higher to the UK to match the greater demand.

[egg]

Air Asia is flogging tickets ,, Bk to Stansted ,,travel July to Sept for 6230Bt , l presume it's one way ,,,and only carry on luggage ,,, is that cheap ?????

[PattayaParent]

Air Asia is flogging tickets ,, Bk to Stansted ,,travel July to Sept for 6230Bt , l presume it's one way ,,,and only carry on luggage ,,, is that cheap ?????

Does it include taxes?

When does this BKK to UK service start? I'm only aware of their KL to UK services so far.

[SantiSuk]

If you look at the average content of every flight between London and Bangkok. 75% based in UK/Europe; 25% (at most - probably much lower) based in Thailand. Bigger pool to market to at one end/small pool at the other. Higher demand = pressure on prices. Nothing to do with seasons (well not much) as the phenomenon is observed at any random time of year.

I guess you could argue that the BKK to London is a marginal cost on the fixed cost of operating a London to BKK service so that pricing for that should be at marginal profit rates, which would destroy my theory. Oh bo$$ocks I'm starting to act like an economist

[inthepink]

Who said anything about distance? I was talking about the flight taking more time because of headwinds.

As far as the information about the headwinds being incorrect, that is why I mentioned that I read it somewhere on the Internet and asked a question about it. It seemed to make sense, but I was not sure if it were true.

What you are completely overlooking is the fact that whether you start in Bangkok or you start in London you are going to be flying both ways so how can headwinds make the slightest difference to the cost of a return ticket??

Because when you are flying against headwinds it takes longer than when you are flying with them, so fuel prices would be higher.

Logic isn't your strong point I see.

(I won't bother pursuing this any further because I remember from a previous encounter with you on the Chiang Mai forum that you are incapable of admitting when you are wrong. You spent pages insisting that Bangkok had nothing more to offer than Chiang Mai as a place to live, then on another thread a couple of weeks later, stated that you wouldn't live in Bangkok because there are so many tempting things to spend your money on!!!)

[crazygreg44]

Now that is an answer that a retired economics professor can live with.

And replying to Ricardo: it was a froggy airline, not Air France, name escapes me.

UTA, perhaps, who used to serve France's far-flung dominions, such as Nouvelle Caledonie ?

One source that I Googled said that the flight is longer on the return trip because of headwinds. Could the extra cost be because of that?

Good one, UG, the slight-snag being that since we're talking return-flights, they all have the jetstream in their face from east-to-west, and a beneficial tail-wind when west-to-east, regardless of where the airline is based, or where their passengers purchased their tickets.

Now if we were talking round-the-world, with flights from west-to-east only, that might be a different matter.

Now folks, these leaves me dazzled and confused ! so could it be that - the flight BKK-LON actually taking ONE MORE HOUR than the reverse - because the Earth's rotation is alongside this flight ? On the trip LON-BKK you fly AGAINST the rotation, thus it takes longer ? If you have ever been aboard such flights, have you dared to do the count ? And why is it so ? Jet Stream ?! Headwinds ?! Does the rotation make a difference ? Our expert professor up front , please !

[electrozebra]

Air Asia is flogging tickets ,, Bk to Stansted ,,travel July to Sept for 6230Bt , l presume it's one way ,,,and only carry on luggage ,,, is that cheap ?????

Does it include taxes?

When does this BKK to UK service start? I'm only aware of their KL to UK services so far.

Looking today at Jul / Aug / Sep.

15 kilo checked luggage. 7 kilo hand. Pay to check in baggage. 700 Baht airport fees for Stanstead.

Hard to find your prices though. Found this promo fare :-

Depart FD3571 /D72008 Bangkok (BKK) to London (STN)Tuesday, 27 September 2011

Depart 0710 Arrive 2140Transfer in Kuala Lumpur (KUL)

6,790.00 THB1 Guest @ 6,790.00

THB700.00 THB Airport charges & fees 7,490.00 THB Total

Still very reasonable considering school holiday season in UK. I do not like the arrival time. Late evening and by the time you get your baggage there are few trains to anywhere. But at that price maybe worth a stop over at a hotel for the night.

[Ulysses G.]

It has nothing to do with headwinds. People are talking about return tickets (prices for singles are almost the same anyhow) which means that the amount of time flying against a headwind will be the same whichever end you are starting from.

Maybe this is about American versus British English. To me a 'return" ticket means a one way return ticket to London as opposed to what I would call a round-trip ticket which goes both ways. I was guessing that a one way ticket that takes several hours more might be more expensive. Sorry about the confusion.

return ticket n Brit a ticket entitling a passenger to travel to his destination and back against US and Canadian equivalent round-trip ticket

round trip n USA a trip to a place and back again, esp returning by a different route hc_dict()

Edited January 19, 2011 by Ulysses G.

[egg]

Air Asia is flogging tickets ,, Bk to Stansted ,,travel July to Sept for 6230Bt , l presume it's one way ,,,and only carry on luggage ,,, is that cheap ?????

Does it include taxes?

When does this BKK to UK service start? I'm only aware of their KL to UK services so far.

l think it is an all in price ,,, check out the Air Asia web site ,,,,they seem to have different promo's every week

chers egg

[electrozebra]

Agree, look for the bargains on the internet.

Twice recently I found 1 way BKK - Stanstead for under £280 in February.

Taxes were abt £99 for LHR and £14 for Stanstead. That is a big differece also.

OK, no trains from Stanstead, but the regular bus service is £2 non-stop to Kings Cross and takes abt 1 hour 30 minutes.. I, like many others automatically think of LHR or MAN when flying to the UK until I started using price comparison sites and listing London ALL airports.

Stansted Express direct to Liverpool Street. 45 mins. 20 quid single on the day. Cheaper if booked in advance.

My mistake on saying no trains from Stansted. It was all down to the spelling. I was inputting 'Stanstead' with an 'A' when trying to get a rail ticket booked and the search engines were not helpful in that regard.

Now I have a flight to London Stansted 1 way at £275 and rail travel from Stansted to Peterborough and North onward from Peterborough. As ever there is the need to dig about for fares. The fare from stansted to my final destination was £101 with 3 changes of station and a tube run to Kings cross involved. By inputting Peterbourough as 1 destination and then onward from there I miss out London altogether and at a cost of £45 total and not the £101 quoted and both are reduced fares.

Looking at fares coming back I can get UK - BKK 1 year return for £450 with the likes of Emirates and I am also able to change the return date. That is a lot cheaper than BKK - UK return. Makes the fares from BKK - UK return expensive indeed. Plus I can come back to Thailand when I am ready. Now I have time to see the doctor, get a new passport and see the dentist too. No rush, no panic to get everything sorted before a pre booked return from BKK.

Off topic but I was pleasantly surprised to see how cheap it is to get a new passport in the UK. 48 page jumbo passport for £90 when i was expecting it to be over £150.

[Ricardo]

Off topic but I was pleasantly surprised to see how cheap it is to get a new passport in the UK. 48 page jumbo passport for £90 when i was expecting it to be over £150.

It's a minor technicality, but the paperwork for getting a passport in the UK is clear, that you need to be resident in the UK to apply for a passport at that reduced-rate.

So if your tax-residence is at all important to you, you might prefer to remain non-UK/EC-resident, and get the new passport via Hong Kong ? Would they pick up on it ? Who knows ? !

I looked at this, but decided the risk wasn't worth the extra saving, having worked so hard to escape the dreaded tax-man in the first place, especially now that they're under pressure to collect more money ! Those MPs' duck-houses don't come cheap, you know !

[MAJIC]

I think you are all trying to be too Technical here,its simply the usual stitch up the Farangs,I can't see any other logical reason.

Good old fashioned greed would be my first bet,and lack of competition. :jap:

[samran]

They charge more, because they can, supply & demand drives down prices out of London, been that way for decades. Good news if you're UK-based & bad once you move to live here.

I recently managed to book BKK-LHR-BKK on Egyptair, for under B26,000 going in mid-June & returning late-July, but that was for two specific dates via their web-site & has anyway now gone-up to B27.5k. Aeroflot as-usual seem fairly cheap, too.

When a "Ricardo" comments on supply and demand, i can not help but smile.....

You have a famous ancestor.....

Sorry for the inside joke of an ex economics proffessor.

Frigging Ricardian equivalence....