New Ukrainian budget airline SkyUp launched ticket sales for its first international flights on Oct. 23, reported avianews.com, an airline information portal.
SkyUp, created in June 2016, previously performed only charter flights. The first one was made on May 21, 2018 from Kyiv to the Egyptian Red Sea vacation resort of Hurghada.
The company will now make low-cost flights to four destinations – Barcelona in Spain, Tbilisi in Georgia, Sofia in Bulgaria, and Poprad in Slovakia.
Tickets, the prices of which start from 30 euros, are already available for booking on the official website of the airline. The flights themselves will start from late December 2018.
The cheapest tickets available are to Poprad, for Hr 983, or around 30 euros. However, these tickets are available only from January, while in December the only day available is Dec. 29 and the price of a ticket is nearly three times more – Hr 2,584, or 80 euros.
A one-way trip from Kyiv to Tbilisi will cost Hr 1,503, or 46 euros, while a return trip costs 68 euros.
Tickets to Barcelona in Spain cost from 60 euros in December to 46 euros in January.
Surprisingly, the most expensive and restricted trips are from Kyiv to Sofia, Bulgaria. There are only three days currently available – Dec. 28, Jan. 4 and Jan. 11. The price of tickets is the highest at Hr 3,735, or 115 euros, except for on Jan. 11 when it’s only 46 euros.
SkyUp’s low-cost tickets come in three classes – Basic, Standard, and Flex.
Basic tariff tickets cannot be exchanged or refunded, and allow only 7 kilograms of freehand baggage.
Standard allows hand luggage and one suitcase up to 23 kilograms free. Tickets can be exchanged or refunded for a fee.
The Flex tariff offers the same conditions as the Standard one, with the addition of the ability to cancel a ticket.
SkyUp obtained its Third Country Operator certificate from the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) on Oct. 2, giving it the right to fly to the twenty-eight European Union countries, as well as the four countries that are members of the European Free Trade Association – Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein.
The airline currently owns two Boeing 737-800s, made in 2013, which were previously operated by Malaysia Airlines.
SkyUp has also ordered five more aircraft for a total cost of $624 million directly from Boeing’s plant in Seattle – two Boeing 737 MAX 8s, and three Boeing 737 MAX 10s. The aircraft are expected to be delivered in 2023, according to the Center for Transport Strategies, a transport research and consulting organization based in Kyiv.
