BANGKOK, 19 March 2018: EVA Airlines has opened reservations for a new direct service from Taipei to Chiang Mai that will be welcomed by residents living in North Thailand.
A check of the airline’s website shows the airline is accepting bookings from 1 July, this year, for a daily service to Chiang Mai from Taipei Taoyuan.
But the airline’s public relations and sales department in Bangkok has not released any information and travel agencies in the north are asking for more details.
The new service will be an important link for residents in North Thailand provinces, not just Chiang Mai, as they will be able to avoid travelling via Bangkok’s congested airports, flying direct to Taipei and then connecting with flights to Japan, South Korea and west coast USA.
EVA Airlines’ Bangkok sales office was not picking up the telephone, or responding with email information to TTR Weekly’s request for more information.
So until they do, information is sketchy on launch fares and promotions. However, the airline’s website pegs the best roundtrip fare on the route, late July, at THB14,281 (USD459) in the lowest fare category.
The first reports of the new service were posted by Taiwan News, last week, which said EVA Airlines’ head office had announced it would launch a daily direct flight between Taipei and Thailand’s northern city, Chiang Mai, in the coming summer.
The new service will cater mainly to Taiwanese travellers who are keen to explore secondary destinations in Thailand rather than just visit its beaches.
But there is also potential to sell seats on the return sector to northern Thailand residents, who are looking for new travel experiences on direct flights from Chiang Mai that skip Bangkok connections
The daily flights will depart from Taipei at 0725 and from Chiang Mai at 1130. Using a 184-seat Airbus A321. the flight time is around four hours. The plane has eight seats in business class and 176 seats economy class.
Thailand welcomed 572,964 tourists from Taiwan in 2017.
Travel agents in Thailand (members of the Association Thai Travel Agents Association) provided land tour services for 11,859 travellers from Taiwan in the first two months of 2018, a 47.39% improvement year-on-year.
They were mainly travellers, who booked tour packages with Taiwanese travel companies that in turn sub-contracted Thai travel agents to handle their client arrangements in Thailand.
