Air India offers 'hefty' last-minute booking discounts

In a huge respite to passengers reeling under the impact of exorbitant fares since the grounding of Jet Airways, national carrier Air India Friday said it will sell last-minute tickets at a "hefty discount".

Earlier, an airline official had told PTI that it would offer a flat 50 percent discount on last-minute bookings.

Air India has decided to sell the very last minutes inventory within three hours of departure at a "hefty discount," the airline said in a statement, without quantifying the discount.

The decision was taken at a commercial review meeting of the airline at its headquarters on Friday, the airline statement added.

Generally, customers are forced to shell out over 40 percent or more for the last-minute bookings over the average fares. However, in case of a demand-supply mismatch following the grounding of Jet Airways, the difference is much higher normally, an airline official said.

Now the last-minute travellers, especially those travelling for urgencies, can book tickets at a much cheaper level, the airline added.

Tickets can be booked from its counters, on the website, on the mobile app, or through agents, the statement said.