Hmmmm, so fly from BKk to Phuket for about 500 baht, and then pay about 500 baht for a meter taxi to Phuket town ????

Posted by Elizabeth on September 3, 2014 22:45

That is an astonishingly cheap fare - costs over 2000 baht in gasoline to do that trip by road depending on size & type of vehicle. Okay - there will be hidden extras like baggage weight or whatever, but still 'budget'.

Posted by Logic on September 4, 2014 07:04

probably the price for travelling in the cargo hold
It goes up if you want to sit in a seat and are not among the first few to book a flight

Posted by Peter Allen on September 4, 2014 10:12

Explains why airlines worldwide are loosing millions if not billions per year like Qantas and others recently. Taxi from Melbourne airport to city area (similar Phuket distances)is A$90 (equiv Bht2,700 approx) people tell me London and other cities would be same if not higher than Australia. Taxi cars here are of good standard, car prices are some 20% higher here than in Australia for example. Give me a Phuket taxi fare anytime... "my adivse - buy a cheap one way air ticket back home and don't come back" and enjoy where you come from at way higher prices...

Posted by Get Real on September 4, 2014 10:50

@GetReal most if not all cities like London have trains, both fast and multistep and buses which are cheaper than virtually the only option here in Phuket of taxis. There was a bus service but I have not heard of this is still going. Ed, is the bus still running and if so where to?

Posted by Feisty Farang on September 4, 2014 12:30

" 515 baht, plus extras. "

what really counts is the final ( real) price

Posted by Surang on September 4, 2014 22:00

You cannot comapare air fares like this with taxi fares. This is a new route being established by a non-Thai company that can and must be subsidising its fares from revenue on other routes in order to gain a foothold in a highly competitive market. Taxi drivers are individulas who are being set fares over which in future they will have no control. I pay $90 (approx 4500 baht) for a 100 mile round trip to our airport for our 26000 mile round trip to Thailand which this year will cost $530 (approx 27,800 baht) So our airfare is 6 times the cost of the taxi for a journey that is 260 times the distance. If you try and relate Lion Air's very obvious Loss Leader return fare to a return taxi fare from the airport to say Patong, the taxi fare should be about 20 baht!

Posted by Alan on September 4, 2014 22:25

"Lion, with its home in Indonesia........." That's all I need to know to stay well clear.

Posted by Larry P on September 4, 2014 23:49

@Alan there are very few places (if any) that are 13,000 miles away from Thailand, even UK to NZ is less than that. Where do you live?

Posted by Feisty Farang on September 5, 2014 14:42

This is why Lion Air is cheap !!

Lion air historically has had issues being banned from flying to the EU and USA poorly trained pilots , poor sketchy maintenance and many crashes of course its cheap ! In January 2012, the Transportation Ministry said that it sanctioned Lion Air because some of its pilots and crew members were found in recent months to be in possession of crystal methamphetamine. In late 2011 Muhammad Nasri and two other co-pilots were arrested at a party in Tangerang; in early 2012 a pilot was caught with crystal meth in Makassar.[10] On 4 February 2012, another Lion Air pilot was arrested following a positive urinalysis test for use of methamphetamine; he was scheduled to fly on Surabaya-Makassar-Balikpapan-Surabaya flight hours later.[11] The licenses of the pilots and crew were revoked. Lion Air, the Indonesian budget carrier whose Boeing 737-800 crashed at a Bali airport on Saturday, has been banned from flying in the European Union since 2007 after being deemed "unsafe." While Indonesia's aviation market is expanding at a rate of 21% annually, the crash of the Lion Air flight in Bali ??? the country's fourth since January 2012 ??? highlights a poor safety record. All 51 Indonesian airlines were banned from flying in the EU in 2007 after a series of fatal accidents, including the March 2007 crash of Garuda Indonesia Flight 200, which killed 21 passengers and one crew member. In 2009, the EU lifted the ban on four of those airlines, including Garuda, and the delegation that made the decision said Lion Air could be taken off the list by the end of that year, the New York Times reported. But the most recent update of the blacklist, published in December 2012, included the budget carrier. The Federal Aviation Administration does not rate, rank, or blacklist airlines, but it has assessed the Indonesian Directorate General of Civil aviation "as not being in compliance" with international safety standards. The State Department suggests Americans traveling to Indonesia avoid local carriers: Indonesian air carriers continue to experience air incidents and accidents. U.S. citizens traveling to and from Indonesia are encouraged to fly directly to their destinations on international carriers from countries whose civil aviation authorities meet international aviation safety standards for the oversight of their air carrier operations under the FAA's International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) program.

Posted by Pete Smith on September 5, 2014 15:45

Feisty Farang
Oops. Meant 13000 mile round trip Manchester to Phuket which means "comparable" taxi fare should be 40 baht. Bargain!!

Posted by Alan on September 5, 2014 17:48