As its latest international accolade, the Thai airline won the Best South-East Asian Airline Award for the 10th year in a row at the 27th Annual TTG Travel Awards 2016 held in Bangkok in September.
This opened the door for Thai Airways International or THAI's induction into the Travel Hall of Fame. Membership is offered only to those organizations that win the same award at least 10 consecutive times.
The Travel Hall Of Fame was inaugurated in 2002 as a 'permanent home' in honour of the Asian region's most outstanding organizations and companies. Those who make it in to the Travel Hall of Fame no longer compete in subsequent TTG Travel Awards; as inductees, they are commemorated each year.
Along with the Travel Hall of Fame honorary titles, the TTG Travel Awards recognizes organizations and individuals in the industry across three other categories: Travel Supplier Awards, Travel Agency Awards and Outstanding Achievement Awards. Winners of the Travel Supplier Awards and Travel Agency Awards categories are determined by voting of TTG publication readers across Asia-Pacific, while the TTG editorial team determines winners of the Outstanding Achievement Awards non-voting category.
The induction into the TTG Travel Hall of Fame for the Thai national flag carrier comes shortly after it won the coveted titles of World's Most Improved Airline and World's Best Airline Spa Facility at the Skytrax 2016 World Airline Awards in July. The spa title was awarded for the airline's Royal Orchid Spa at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International Airport.
The Skytrax World Airline Awards are recognized as quality accolades for the global airline industry. Each year, winners are decided in an airline passenger satisfaction survey participated in by travelers from around the world. The latest 2015-2016 survey saw 19.2 million entries.
In what was a particularly impressive showing this year, THAI also placed among the top three in the categories of Best Economy Class Airline Catering – for the quality of meals, beverage selection and visual presentation; Best Airline Staff in Asia – for staff service efficiency, friendliness and service hospitality, staff language skills and overall quality consistency of staff; and World's Best Airport Services – for quality of airport staff services and general airport product facilities across departures, arrivals and transit travel at an airline's home-base airport.
Suvarnabhumi International Airport is the home-base airport and global hub for THAI, from where it flies to over 60 destinations in Europe, Asia/Pacific and the Middle East. In October 2016, the airline launched a new 4 times weekly direct service between Bangkok and Iran's capital city of Tehran, and in the middle of December will resume flights between Bangkok and Moscow.
A founding member of the Star Alliance network, THAI operates an average of 975 roundtrip flights per week on domestic, regional and intercontinental routes. Its domestic services within Thailand, together with subsidiary THAI Smile, link 10 destinations around the kingdom with the capital Bangkok.
Through THAI's website thaiairways.com, travelers can search and book online flights from Thailand – such as flights from Bangkok to Frankfurt, flights from Bangkok to London or direct flights from Thailand to Australia – and look for great deals on flights to Thailand, as well as take care of other travel matters like booking hotel and resort accommodation and purchasing travel insurance.
Martin Wynn
