AirAsia has launched its monthly passes where you could travel in parts of SE Asia up to the value of purchased credits.
While the price can end up more or less than purchasing tickets individually (pass doesn't cover taxes!) some people have discovered nasty surprises making the pass worthless. Not only do you need to book more than 14 days in advance but AirAsia blocks a lot of routes during peak periods or only let's you fly one of the legs offered that day - if any. You can't book more than one ticket at a time and if your credits don't add up to 10 or 20 you're throwing away more money. Read the replies inhttp://traveldave.co.uk/airasia-asean-pass/
Despite removing the fuel surcharges AirAsia's prices from Perth during the latest promotional periods are equivalent to what I could get from Sydney in the past. The declining Aussie dollar plays its part I'm sure but it's hard to justify AirAsia when full-service companies like Qantas have come out with better deals.
The Air Asia's of this world have fantastic fares, if you book a long way in advance.
Generally at last minute, they are close to 100% full(if yield manager has done his or her job properly), so not that special fares.
Did an $88 fare on Scoot to Singapore. Spoke to someone at some tourist spot, who said he tried to get similar but found "regular" airlines similar price, (because he was too slow to get $88 deal or wanted to fly soon & not long way out).
Even saw cases recently where a low cost airline was more than Qantas (one of the highest cost airlines in the world).
Why ?
Cos low cost was probably full & Qantas probably wasn't, meaning when cheapest Qantas fares usually sell out fast, they hadn't, maybe cos many were flying the low cost carrier, rather than Qantas.
This is Qantas's problem & very hard to fix or compete on price alone. Qantas weren't dumping seats, but if their yield management goes to plan, then all the cheaper fares would have gone earlier, where in this case they hadn't.