BA takes off on Kuala Lumpur-London route

British Airways' (BA) daily direct Kuala Lumpur-London service that began yesterday has been well received both by passengers and the travel trade. 

Flights today and yesterday were almost full, with only two spare seats available, Jamie Cassidy, BA’s area general manager, Asia-Pacific, Middle East & Africa, told TTG Asia e-Daily.

Malaysian travel consultants have welcomed the new flights, which offer more capacity and better flight timings on a route once monopolised by national carrier Malaysia Airlines (MAS).

Jill Sin, senior manager MICE, Panorama Tours Malaysia, said: “For MICE groups travelling to the UK, the new services, coupled with MAS’ twice-daily flights on this route using the Airbus A380, will allow group sizes of up to 350 to travel on the same day. Before, such groups had to be split and moved in batches.

“Although the ringgit has depreciated against major currencies such as the pound and the euro, multi-level marketing companies and insurance companies are still incentivising their top-tier achievers with reward trips to the UK and US. This has not slowed down.”

Inbound travel consultant, Arokia Das, senior manager at Luxury Tours Malaysia, also said: “The new service is good for our travel consultant partners in the UK as it makes it easier for them to communicate with the airline and negotiate for better rates.

“We have a group of 50 leisure tourists from the UK coming to Malaysia on BA in the third week of December.”

When asked if BA intends to increase the frequency on this route in future, Robert Williams, British Airways regional commercial manager, South-east Asia, sidestepped the question: “We’re happy with our offering, double overnight services that allows our passengers from Kuala Lumpur to get a good night’s rest and arrive in London fresh in the morning. We offer passengers a choice of four cabins.”

On the other hand, BA is upgrading its thrice-weekly, A380 London-Singapore service to daily from December 1, said Cassidy.

-TTG Asia.