British Airways, the flag carrier of the United Kingdom, is offering round-trip tickets from Lagos to London for economy-class passengers on Saturday flights at a rate of N5,537,604.
Competitors such as Air Peace, Ethiopian Airlines, Air France, and Turkish Airways are offering similar routes at substantially lower prices.
The According gathered this information from reputable travel websites on Friday.
Ethiopian Airlines, for instance, now sells the same ticket for N1,628,660, down from N1,641,249 sold last week. Air France’s price has dropped to N1,687,824, nearly halving from last month N2,482,138.
Nigerian Air Peace is offering tickets at N1,496,794, while Turkish Airways prices the same route at N3,597,690.
This pricing discrepancy is notable when compared to ticket prices from March 4, 2024.
Lufthansa offered it at N1,966,165. Qatar Airways provided the same ticket for N2,016,824, and KLM priced it at N2,448,740.
Air Peace launched its direct flight operations to Gatwick Airport in London, offering tickets at a competitive rate of N1.2m.
The airline conducted its inaugural flight to London with 260 passengers aboard a Boeing 777, which has a capacity of 274 seats, on Saturday. The route will be served daily from Lagos.
Analysts said the move has disrupted market dynamics, prompting foreign airlines that previously enjoyed exclusivity on the route to reconsider their pricing strategies.
Early this week, former President of the National Association of Nigeria Travel Agencies, Bankole Bernard, stated that Air Peace’s pricing strategies have compelled foreign carriers to slash their fares.
Bernard emphasised that failure by foreign airlines to adjust their ticket prices on the Lagos-London route could potentially lead to their exit from the market.
“There are two major destinations that Nigerians fly to. Number one is Dubai and Dubai has been out of it for a while now. So, we (Nigerians) have resorted to the London route. The UK route is where a lot (of foreign carriers) use to earmark their airfares.
“Now that Air Peace has come into that space with a direct flight that will not cause any layover in any other country, the price has dropped. Why? What happened? Is there magic around that? We should be able to question what made the prices drop.”
According to Bernard, prices would drop as long as there was another form of supply that was different from the conventional ones
