Tigerair stops Manila-Phuket flights

Budget carrier Tigerair Philippines “temporarily” ended flights from Manila to Phuket, Thailand on Sunday, after only three months of operations, as the low passenger volume to the Thai beach hotspot made the route unprofitable, a company official said.

Tigerair Philippines Jose Laurente Jr. cited challenges to selling flights to both the passengers bound for Phuket and those going to Manila. He said load factor, a measure of passenger load, was at only 50 percent.

“It was not really performing as expected. We saw that people still preferred to go direct to Bangkok and then fly to Phuket,” Laurente said.

“In the region, we also compete with Philippine beaches like Boracay. So, for some, why go to Phuket if we have nice beaches here also?”

“It was a challenge as well to sell Phuket flights bound for Manila,” he added.

The airline mounts to Bangkok, Hong Kong and Singapore out of Clark International Airport.

The Manila-Phuket route was launched in September this year.

Laurente said internal projections did not meet the required profitability thresholds.

He said the airline would explore new international routes as the company was set to launch next year flights to Japan, South Korea, and Macau, China.

Tigerair Philippines operates five aircraft composed of medium-range Airbus A320s and A319s. It plans to boost its fleet to 25 planes in three to five years.

The budget airline, a unit of Singapore’s Tiger Airways Ltd., sought to differentiate itself from the competition by offering more leg room and giving options, for a fee, to passengers seeking more than the typical “no-frills” services associated with the budget airline business model.