10% hike: Air Astana on prices for air tickets

Air Astana Kazakhstan’s National Airline has no plans to hike prices for domestic flights air tickets, Erbol Ospanov, the company’s spokesman told a briefing today. Starting from February 11, 2014 Kazakhstan’s Central Bank decided to stop supporting the tenge exchange rate, decrease currency interventions and stop interference with shaping the tenge exchange rate. “The Airline has no plans to hike ticket prices for domestic flights”, he told at the President’s Public Communications Service. He elaborated that the Company had changed its prices for international flights. “The overall price hike is 7-10%; for some routes such as Astana-Moscow, Almaty-Moscow, Astana-Istanbul, Almaty-Istanbul the prices remain unchanged”, he added. He admitted that “the 20% currency devaluation will have an impact on the company’s financial performance as 70% of sales are in the national currency, with 65% of expenses being in US Dollars”. “In case of international flights mutual settlements [with other countries] are done in US Dollars and Euro. Aircraft and spare parts are leased and purchased in foreign currencies. The Company is certain to face some hardships, but we are fully aware of our social responsibility”, he said.