Qatar Airways Thailand is offering heavily-discounted air fares this week to drum up sales in a move it insists is not being triggered by the Gulf blockade.
The cash-rich airline's sales campaign, quietly launched on Monday, sees a round-trip all-inclusive economy fare from Bangkok to Europe via its Doha base begin at 18,099 baht and business class starting at 78,899 baht.
The discounts are more than 25% below the normal fares and tickets are good for travel until March 14 next year.
Executives familiar with Qatar Airways operations, said the campaign in Thailand is part of a worldwide promotion the airline planned before the diplomatic crisis began on June 5.
Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and several other countries severed diplomatic ties with Qatar and cut off air, sea and land travel to the peninsular nation.
Executives said the Qatar Airways ticket sale campaign was earlier scheduled to start on June 8 and end on Monday.
But the crisis delayed the start of the campaign, which now started Monday and ends on Friday, as Qatar Airways was forced to attend to a more pressing issue − the closure of airspace.
Qatar Airways has been addressing issues related to the confidence of customers concerned about their flights being jeopardised by the Gulf blockade and diplomatic row.
The airline is not using airspace over Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain or Egypt, but is flying through a narrow corridor over Iran, meaning it has to make detours.
The carrier operates five daily non-stop flight between Doha and Bangkok, as well as twice-daily Doha-Phuket flights and Doha-Krabi operations (four flights a week).
Emirates Thailand has countered the ticket sales campaign with offers to match.
The all-inclusive round-trip economy fare on Emirates flights from Bangkok to London starts at 24,305 baht and 96,015 baht for business class.
The sales period is longer than Qatar Airways -- from Monday to June 30 with outbound travel restricted to Nov 30 this year.