Singapore resumes booking of new tickets on VTL flights to and from India

Singapore has resumed booking of new tickets on select-bilateral flights to India under the Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) agreement after the South Asian nation had decided to temporarily suspend booking of designated VTL flights till January 20. One month ago, Singapore Airlines (SIA) had announced that it will stop accepting new bookings for all VTL flights into Singapore scheduled between December 22 and January 20. The flag-carrier of Singapore in an update said that starting January 21, travellers from India were allowed to book VTL flights for quarantine-free travel into Singapore. The airline currently operates select VTL flights from India from Delhi, Mumbai, and Chennai. Vistara is operating VTL flights from Mumbai, while Chennai only operates one VTL flight, which SIA operates. Delhi has one VTL flight and rest all are non-VTL flights. All the VTL flights from India are operational daily. Placing regulatory restrictions, the Singapore government last month had said that it will temporarily reduce the VTL quotas and ticket sales for travel after January 20, 2022. For flights, the total ticket sales were also touted to be capped at 50 per cent of the allocated quota. VTL flights allowed quarantine free travel to the island-state for the fully vaccinated travellers. SIA had commenced passenger flight services from eight Indian cities, including daily VTL services from Chennai, Delhi, and Mumbai from November 29, providing eligible customers with quarantine-free entry into Singapore. Eligibility and requirement for VTL flight to/from India Pre-departure: A RT-PCR test taken within 72 hours before departure. Test results must be uploaded on the Air Suvidha portal. On-arrival: Travellers may be selected randomly to undergo an on-arrival PCR test. Post-arrival: A RT-PCR test required on Day 8. Children aged below 5 are exempted. Exemption: With effect from January 23, 2022, 2359 hours (SGT), VTL travellers who recently recovered from Covid-19 (i.e., within seven to 90 days of their last infection before departure to Singapore) are exempted from all testing requirements, if they provide appropriate documentary proof of their recovery. The SIA Group operates VTL services from 34 cities in its global network to Singapore. With the addition of Perth from February 5, 2022, this number will increase to 35 cities.