Qatar Airways, the only carrier from the Middle East flying to Viet Nam, has plans to add one more flight to its current four flights per week between Doha and Ho Chi Minh City to meet increasing demand, an airline senior executive said.
Speaking at a press briefing in HCM City September 12, Mr. Ali Al Rais, Qatar Airways executive vice president in commerce, said he was impressed with the route’s performance since its launch 18 months ago.
“Soon after launching the route with four non-stop flights a week in March last year, we upgraded our craft to the Airbus 330-300 in response to overwhelming passenger demand. We look forward to developing our route to Viet Nam even further and hopefully one day, we will be able to operate with daily flights.”
According to him, the route saw a seat occupancy rate of 50% in the beginning but this has increased up to 90% now. “Especially, we did not have enough seats for overseas Vietnamese during the Lunar New Year holidays.” Explaining this performance, which he said “much better than expected”, Ali Al Rais said among Europeans flying Qatar Airways to Doha, and many of them continued to fly to HCM City.
Another reason for the route’s good performance, as he said, is business and leisure passengers from Viet Nam and neighboring country are able to experience “our five-star service to Doha and beyond to many exciting destinations across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.”
He also said a Doha-Ha Noi route is likely if business is good.
Qatar Airways was an exhibitor in the International Travel Expo HCM City held on September 12-14. The carrier said its participation in 2007 was successful, but did not give detailed proof.
