buying airline tickets in India

Jadeskirt

So the plan is to go to India for 6 months. During that time I will have my young adult children come and travel with me for a few weeks.. one at a time.
My question is, Would I get a better price on their airline tickets if I purchase them from India? Or should we get them in the U.S?

shpatel

Well just checking the AirIndia website, if you claim you are an Indian resident, the price is $1187. If you pick non-resident the price is $1617. Now you really can't claim that you are a resident of India just because you are there. But it may end up being cheaper if you do buy from India just based on the above experiment.

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-m2-

The price of regular tickets with the three major domestic airlines (Jet, Indian Airline, and Sahara) should be the same bought in or out of the country. As a non-resident, you will be paying a $US fare which is higher than residents of India pay and you won't qualify for most of the special fares. I think it would be difficult to try to plan out a six month trip and buy tickets in advance anyway however, and you will probably find that rail travel is convenient for much of your local travel.

Air Deccan, a relatively new discount airline, has cheaper regular fares and non-residents are eligible for the regular fares and for the advance-purchase tickets which can be a real deal. There are quite a few threads dealing with aspects of Air Deccan, try a search. Other new discount airlines might be coming along soon as well.


There was also a recent report here that one of the domestic airlines had a new plan for non-residents that included a certain number of flight coupons for a fixed price (one of the programs allowed 6 month eligibility and thus might be of interest). The poster didn't mention which airline, so you might check the airline web-sites and click on links dealing with promotional fares but be sure that non-residents are eligible.

links:

Indian Airlines: http://indian-airlines.nic.in/scripts/index.asp

Jet Airlways: http://www.jetairways.com/

Air Deccan: http://airdeccan.net/airdeccan/home.asp


...and welcome to Indiamike!

himadventures

Unless you are not on very tight budget-avoid IA/AI -although they are cheap but they ARE cheap !

If you are a NRI-ask someone in India to book,otherwise you will b peying much more than a INDIAN pay here. This is a rule which is best known to very few in world.

I would suggest you..

1. Explore and get refferences of good and reliable travel agent from INDIAN COMMUNITY where you are working and living.

2. He will be giving you much cheaper than a website of airliner is telling you

3. 6 months fare does not come to agents-they have 3 months fare only...so be in touch and regular touch...you can get a INDIA TRIP in 1000 US$ also !!