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Malaysia Airlines has no plans join the likes of Emirates, Qatar Airways, Finnair and Air France/KLM by introducing lower-cost ‘unbundled business class’ fares which strip out perks such as checked luggage, lounge access and a full serve of frequent flyer points.
In fact, it’s even brought back the 10kg checked baggage allowance on its entry-level Economy Lite fare.
The Oneworld member’s Business Basic fare will continue to offer 40kg of checked baggage, free free seat selection, a free one-time change or rebooking and lounge access, says Malaysia Airlines Chief Commercial Officer Dersenish Aresandiran.
“What we want to do in the premium sector is actually improve the offering, to give you something better,” Aresandiran told Executive Traveller on the sidelines of the launch of the airline’s first Boeing 737 MAX jet.
He cites Malaysia Airlines’ recent move to offer free inflight WiFi to all passengers as one example of giving travellers more, rather than less.
Yet Aresandiran has seen unbundling up close during the recent years he worked with Qatar Airways as Vice-President of Sales for the Asia region, with Qatar’s Business Lite fares controversially removing airport lounge access and free advance seat selection.
Malaysia Airlines exec Dersenish Aresandiran wants to give more to passengers, rather than take things away.
Pulling out core parts of the business class experience makes it harder to differentiate fares, Aresandiran argues.
“If you unbundle and say ‘I’ll give you no WiFi, no baggage, no lounge’, maybe that’s also similar to somebody who’s buying a high economy fare, so how you actually differentiate that?”
“So we go out with an all-complimentary offer. We’ve got baggage, we’ve got meals and the lounge and other flexibility that starts off from the lowest fair already.”
Also read: Malaysia Airlines A330 business class review
Malaysia Airlines’ approach to inflight Internet also bucks a trend, in this case the need for passengers to be members of the airline’s loyalty program and have their membership number entered into their booking.
“Most airlines enable WiFi (only) for frequent flyer members,” Aresandiran says, while also citing restrictions such as messaging only or being limited to a few hundred megabytes of data.
“We are probably one of the few in the world right now that offers WiFi to everybody, in business and economy as well.”
“If you go on other carriers, you’re limited to X amount of usage either by size or by time, and our speeds are amazing as well.“
Also review: Malaysia Airlines WiFi review
The author travelled to Kuala Lumpur as a guest of Malaysia Airlines.
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