Air Fare Increases and Schedule Reductions

[PeterRS]

With Trump pulling out of talks on reopening the Straits of Hormuz, the jet fuel situation can only get worse. Some airlines have already increased fuel surchares. Cathay Pacific started this last month. Since April 1 there has been a second round of increases. All tickets irrespective of class now attract an additional 34% surcharge. Round trip flights to Australia, New Zealand, USA, Canada, Europe, Middle East and Africa now have a US$500 surcharge. Inter-Asian tickets now add US$100. On long haul flights this represents a 174% increase in little less than one month. The carrier has also stated it will review fuel surcharge amounts every two weeks.

Singapore Airlines has already raised fares but I can not find out by how much because the airline merges fuel costs into the basic ticket price. THAI has said it plans to increase by 10%-15% which seems pretty low compared to the hikes by CX. 

As I wrote yesterday, there are still some deals to be had with Qatar now offering limited business class seats from Bangkok to London at Bt. 99,000 for the next few weeks. But with Doha having the USA's largest air base in the Middle East and already targetted by Iranian drones, the chances of last minute cancellations must surely be quite high.  

19 of 20 major airlines have already cut capacity. Lufthansa is cutting 20,000 flights over the next 6 months. United plans to cut 5% of capacity and the airline's CEO has stated that fares may have to go up by 15%-20%. Air New Zealand has slashed flights for May and June.

https://milelion.com/2026/03/27/cathay-pacific-hikes-fuel-surcharges-for-the-second-time-in-two-weeks/

https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/flight-cancellations-airlines-lufthansa-united-easyjet-jet-fuel-shortage-b2964033.html

[TMax]

I've been looking at Thai Airways Perth / Bangkok fares for early November and at the moment the cheapest business class is about $4100 Australian but will have to wait until June to make my booking, I only look at business because now days as I just hate economy cattle class. Hoping the fares don't jump too much between now and the time I book but if it does I will just have to suck it up. Qantas and Jetstar (2 crap airlines) have already started dropping some routes (domestic ones mainly), mostly the not so busy ones but they will likely be looking at some other routes but I did hear something about reduction in international flight frequency on some routes.