AirAsia Now Accepting American Express

AirAsia has dramatically expanded its potential customer base by now accepting American Express for bookings made online, through AirAsia Call Centres and sales counters.

The partnership is expected to grow inbound and outbound travel by attracting high-spending American Express Cardmembers to fly with AirAsia.

AirAsia is supporting the partnership by also extending its popular low fares to American Express Cardholders. Flights from Kuala Lumpur are as low as RM5 to Singapore, RM25 to Kuching and Bangkok, RM45 to Jakarta, RM500 to Tianjin (Beijing) and Perth, RM800 to Melbourne and Gold Coast, and RM1,500 to London. These fares are valid for bookings made before May 3, 2009 for travel between July 1 and November 30, 2009.

American Express is a recognized global leader of travel and payment services, with a presence in over 140 countries and products accepted by millions of merchants in over 200 countries and territories.

“AirAsia is pleased to offer 5-star service for low fares to a previously under-tapped market segment, American Express Cardmembers. We saw a 21% year-on-year increase in our passenger volume for the first quarter of this year, when we flew 3.1 million guests. We are confident that this number will grow now that American Express Cardmembers are able to easily book seats with us. We increased seat capacity by 25% in the last quarter, and we are well positioned to cater to more guests. Anticipating American Express Cardmembers’ enthusiasm to fly with us, we will be serving more high-spending guests, including more business executives,” said Tony Fernandes, AirAsia Group CEO.

Kula Kulendran, Senior Vice President, Head of Global Network Services, Japan, Asia Pacific & Australia, American Express said, “American Express has been continuously pursuing an airline partnership strategy in key markets around the world to help enhance our partners’ product offerings. The partnership with AirAsia and Maybank leverages American Express’ leadership position and heritage in both corporate travel and premium consumer segments. American Express Cardmembers are sophisticated travelers who look for travel services with value for money, convenience and efficiency.”

American Express purchases through mobile phones at mobile.airasia.com will be enabled over the next few weeks. Worldwide American Express Cardmembers can now purchase tickets from any origin to any destination using AirAsia Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand websites. Market websites for Australia, India, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam are to be American Express enabled over the coming weeks, followed by rest of the markets.

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