JEDDAH, 28 June — Domestic passengers traveling by Saudi Arabian Airlines started paying SR10 more for each trip from yesterday.
Anyone buying a return ticket has now to pay SR20 more. The increase in the domestic fare has been introduced for all its three classes — tourist, horizon and first.
Local travel agents confirmed the SR10 hike in the airline’s gross domestic fare and said passengers were surprised as it was effected without prior announcement.
"We came to know about the fare increase through the computer reservation system (CRS)," Mohammed Ali Nayyar, supervisor at Kanoo Travel, said when contacted by Arab News. "We’ve had no prior information. Nor do we know the reason for the increase," he added.
Meanwhile, according to Saudia Director General Dr. Khaled ibn Bakr, the airline’s volume of passenger traffic increased to 14 million last year, two million more than the previous year, despite upheavals in the air transport industry worldwide.
He told a function marking the opening of the pilot training center here earlier this week that the airline carried a record number of 780,000 pilgrims from 57 international destinations during the last Haj season. It meant a 500,000 increase compared to the previous year. The number of Umrah passengers had also risen remarkably.
The airline aims to transport a total of 4.6 million people on 26,973 scheduled and additional flights in the domestic and international sectors this summer.
It plans to operate 7,813 international flights to carry 1.6 million passengers and 19,260 flights to transport three million domestic passengers.
