Choon Yong and I were travelling on the same flight and our discussion at SFO airport came to the following conclusion:We were lucky to get tickets on to this flight for $1095 US in May having booked the flight in May when looking for fares. Most travel agents as well as the search engines were quoting higher prices on Singapore and other airlines, and their quotes did not appear to include fuel surcharge and taxes. This low fare was actually found on the Singapore Airlines website. This was a pleasant surprise since we noted that usualy SIA fares commanded a premium.
A bonus was that the trip is on SQ1 leaving SFO after midnight and arriving in Singapore before noon. All round, this is a very convenient flight for departing and arriving. Since it is a direct flight, though not non-stop, there is no change of plane, and less handling of bags and risk of luggage loss or misrouting. The best price offered on the web was $1300 US, and did not appear to include tax. Since SIA did not appear on the fares quotes, it did not appear to be a good viable option. In was in May that Choon Yong found this flight and asked me if there were better flights elsewhere, and since at the time there was nothing that appeared more competitive, even with additional stops, we made reservations on this flight.
The lesson to be learnt - if you are travelling to or through Singapore, check out the SingaporeAir website in addition to all the other travel websites and travel agents you hear or know about. SIA agrees to match any lower price for the same class of travel with same terms and conditions if you get in touch with SIA by 12 midnight Pacific Time of the day on which you paid for the SIA ticket by credit card. Also, SIA seems to be one of the few airlines that has SFO-SIN as a direct flight on the same plane. (Too many times, I have encountered occasions when the flight number is the same but there is a plane change with the corresponding inconvenience of going through immigration and security checks).
See the next post - the flight experience itself
Thursday, July 31, 2008
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Looking forward to seeing you guys again. Come to think of it, Choon Yong and yourself (Shahid) have nit changed much. Your mannerism and charactistics are still reminiscent of the days in shcool.
ReplyDeleteCheers and have a wonderful flight homeward bound (Singapore)
Derrick
Derrick,
ReplyDeleteAs you wrote it, the cohorts had already landed.
Hah, you missed the major changes - a little greyer and sparse on the top, and a bit rounder and wider around the middle :-)
Shahid