JetStar Airbus at Changi Airport, Singapore

Australian budget airline JetStar launched a lightning promotion today (August 20) offering tickets from Singapore to Phuket (one way) for just S$8.00.

The deal is to promote the airline’s relaunch of its Singapore-Phuket service, suspended in March last year due to weak demand. Plainly, thinking in the JetStar offices is more bullish now.

The deal will cover the following periods: January 12 – February 9, Febraury 23 – March 10 and March 23 to May 26. Those wanting to take advantage of it should hurry – the sale lasts until 8pm tonight, and seats seem to be going fast.

The fare includes airport taxes, but allows only carry-on luggage. For more details go here.

The beach at The Chedi makes it easy to get romantic. - Photo courtesy of GHM.

You’ve heard of the fabulous Aman Resorts built in exotic locations aound the world by “the world’s best hotelier” Adrian Zecha. These haunts of royalty, of the rich and famous, of stars of stage, screen and music video, include the first Aman resort, Amanpuri, in Phuket.

What you may not be aware of, if you don’t move in these rarified strata of society, is that Zecha and his people manage many more non-Aman resorts to similarly high standards, through the rather clunkily-named General Hotel Management Ltd, or GHM. But while the name may not be glamorous, the hotels run by GHM definitely are.

One of the them is The Chedi, right next to Amanpuri. And The Chedi is currently offering some very good deals for such an upmarket place.

Classy cottage surrounded by coconut palms at The Chedi. - Photo courtesy of GHM.

Like many other resorts, The Chedi is not chasing only tourists, but also people living in Thailand. If you are Thai or a foreigner holding a work permit or a non-immigrant visa, you qualify for even more discount than is being offered to tourists, so long as you stay for at least two nights.

Here are some prices (per night): One-bedroom hillside cottage, B5,999; two-bedroom superior cottage, 11,999; beach deluxe suite, B21,999. These prices are net – you’ll need to add 10% service charge, 7% VAT and 1% Provincial Tax, but still represent whopping discounts on The Chedi’s rack rate.

The packages include breakfast, airport transfers, upgrade to the next level of luxury (if not already occupied by the aforementioned glitterati), a free set-menu Thai dinner and discounts on food, drinks and spa treatments.
To book email the resort or call +66 76 324017.

Tourists are not being ignored, of course. Checkout the GHM website for discounts being offered to those who arrive at the resort with only a tourist visa.

Classy: The Rebar restaurant and lounge at the Indigo Pearl: Yours for US$68 a night.

Prices for accommodation in Thailand must be the lowest they’ve been in a decade, and the way to get the lowest of the low prices is through the online booking sites.

It’s always been a matter of pride that the big online hotel booking sites offer the lowest prices – indeed, woe betide any hotel that offers a better deal than the one posted on, say, Bangkok/Singapore-based Agoda; once a hotel’s signed a deal with these guys, undercutting is a big no-no.

But what is astonishing now is the depth of the discounts offered by these sites. First, some words of explanation: Prices on hotel booking sites are dynamic – they change constantly with demand and supply. In doing research for this article, we compared prices for a couple checking into the hotel’s cheapest room on July 14 and checking out on the 17th. The prices were obtained between 11am and midday on July 12 from the hotels’ own websites and from Bangkok/Singapore-based Agoda.

The prices given on the hotel websites are usually in baht, while Agoda quotes in US dollars. We used XE.com for realtime currency conversion. Here are the results for five hotels or resorts in Phuket:

Indigo Pearl Resort, Nai Yang Beach, Kelly Quarters room.

Hotel’s website: US$108.73/night; Agoda: US$68/night. Difference: 38%. Agoda also throws in a US$10 “reward” discount for the next booking.

Burasari in Patong is home to Thailand's first restaurant run by celebrity chef Keith Floyd. The bar is a sumptuous as the food.

Twin Palms Resort, Surin Beach, Deluxe Palm Room.

Hotel’s website: US$155.60/night; Agoda: US$99/night. Difference: 37%, plus US$14 reward.

Burasari Hotel, Patong, Classic room.

Hotel website “published” rate: US$176/night, with “buy two nights, get three” deal, for average of US$117/night; Agoda: US$44/night. Difference: 62%, plus US$6 reward.

Alpina Phuket Nalina Resort & Spa, Kata, Classic room.

Hotel website “low season” rate: US$123/night; Agoda: US$46/night. Difference: 63%, plus US$6 reward.

Mom Tri’s Villa Royale, Kata, Beach Wing Suite.

Hotel website, summer season rate: US$205/night; Agoda: US$134/night. Difference: 35%, plus US$19 reward.

Of course, if you walk in off the street and bargain hard, the reception staff of any hotel are going to check all their desk drawers and find extra discounts off the hotel’s website rate. But will they ever be able to match the Agoda numbers? Unlikely. And if they do, then Agoda promises, on receipt of proof, to go even cheaper.

Internet  booking is definitely the way to go these days. Visit Agoda here.

Cheap beer will be a feature of the partying at Laguna from July 8. Do you need any further recommendation?

In the hotel world, when the going gets tough, the tough get the locals. With empty hotel rooms across Phuket (a combination of swine flu + Thai political shakiness + world economic gloom) hotel owners are looking to the local market to put meals and drinks in bellies and snorers in beds.

Leading the pack are the destination marketing crew at Laguna Resorts & Hotels, who are about to launch into their Summer Family Festival, with big discounts (cheap beer), free entertainment and succulent prizes. We’ve mentioned Laguna’s plans before but here’s a list of temptations specifically for locals that will be launched on July 8, lasting until August 30:

• Daily Kid’s Summer Fun program, from 2-5pm, followed by evening entertainment: bouncy castle, face painting, kid’s movies, video games, and so on.
• While the kids are entertained adults can relax in the beer garden (cheap beer) and sports bar where international sporting events will be televised from 5pm. Later on, DJs crank up the music to get the party started.
• And when you’re feeling tired and emotional from the glut of entertainment (and cheap beer), there are hefty discounts for a night at any of the seven Laguna resorts, ranging from B1,799 a night at Allamanda to B5,999 at Laguna Phuket Holiday Residences, with breakfast. Kids stay free at any of the resorts.

Although the deals will be available from July 8, the day to go will be July 10, from 5pm to midnight, when a prize draw will be held to decide who gets a private speedboat trip for six to Phi Phi, which would normally cost B40,000.

On that day there will be free nibbles and drink on arrival, with a barbecue later on (cheap beer), a bouncy castle, magic show, crafts and movies for the kids while sports fans will be kept happy (cheap beer) with big-screen TVs showing either the German Grand Prix or the Ashes (for anyone who’s not English or Australian, see here for an explanation). Those who are seeing double from the cheap beer can probably watch both at the same time.

Oh yes. Did we mention? There will be cheap beer.

Now here’s a deal for anyone in Singapore: Fly with Tiger Airways to Phuket, free. Okay, so you will have to pay something – tax is S$45 (governments always want their pound of flesh) and there are unspecified “charges”. But that’s still a pretty fine deal.

You can also fly to Phuket, return, from Bangkok, for as little as 486 baht, depending on how far ahead you book. That’s on Air Asia. Nok Air is offering the same flights for as little as B257.

These are some of the guys already flying into Phuket. Now Virgin Blue is apparently planning to get in the game with daily flights from Australia.

Budget airlines seem to have spotted something that surprisingly few others have: that holidays in Phuket are really cheap at the moment, with hotels offering all sorts of deals – not surprising when the Phuket Tourism Association is talking about occupancy rates of 25%, compared with the usual figure at this time of year of around 50-60%.

Phuket’s been hit this year by a triple whammy – the Global Economic Blues, the political violence in Bangkok and the Mexican flu.

Let’s look at these problems. The Blues, of course, affect people everywhere. Even if they still have their jobs, many want to hang on to their money. But if you raise your eyes from the piggy bank clutched in your trembling hands, you’ll find that this is a time for great deals.

You’ve already had a taste of the air fares. Hotels in Phuket are just as accommodating. For example, the sooper dooper Serenity Terraces – where Grand Prix hero Kimi Raikonnen has a pied à terre – is currently offering stays for as little as B4,000 a night for couples.

The J W Marriott is offering 50 percent off, Hilton Phuket Arcadia‘s charging around B4,500 a night per room, including taxes, and you can get two nights at the Sheraton Grande Laguna for less than B4,000. That was today. Who knows what tomorrow holds?

So much for the Blues. Now the reds and yellows. In Bangkok, everything is quiet again – no riots by red shirts or yellow shirts for a month. That’s not to say that everything is perfect; there’s probably a way to go before the politics of Thailand gets back to a normal temperature. But Phuket’s 800 km away, and there never was a problem on the island. Bangkok might as well be another country. (Some Phuketians will tell you that it is.)

As for Mexican/swine flu aka H1N1, let’s take a look at the numbers. As of May 21, the World Health Organization lists 85 deaths worldwide. According to the US National Lightning Safety Institute, 24,000 people die each year from lightning strikes. Does that put things in perspective?