Expedia, Doha, Bahrain and Price Discrimination

Why do some online travel agents charge such blatantly bad deals.

There is a 100% (hidden?) markup on a Gulf Air flight from Doha to Bahrain, if you buy it through Expedia.co.uk.

Is this to take advantage of foreigners flying into the Gulf who are simply unaware?

For your convenience I've put the exchange rate as of Oct 31, 2010

780.00 Qatari Rial = 133.726 British Pound 

Expedia.co.uk charges £266 and the Gulf Air site £133

In addition, I've pasted in screen shots below.

Gulf Air, Emirates and the A380

Will keep this short.

I remember in the 80s and 90s when Gulf Air was, for the most part, the main carrier for the Gulf region. It was a great airline, and I was happy to use it and I remember the times when most people I knew (who weren't exposed to the area) didn't know any carriers from the area.

From then to 2010, things have changed.

As things stand now, Emirates has the largest order of A380's in the world out of any carrier, standing order at 90. Gulf Air has none and is aiming to hopefully break even by 2012. While Emirates (if you look at their financials) has more costs and more revenues then most carriers, and even during the worst of the 08 recession, revenues reduced but never did the financial position turn to a loss.

More recently, I read an article that stated Gulf Air has bowed out of the long haul carrier service and is now opting to fight within a smaller perimeter with under served markets in the middle east region like Azerbaijan. At the same time they have terminated their Hong Kong and Singapore routes and Emirates has established nonstop flights to New York and Los Angeles.

Anyhow, you get the picture. Lets see whats to come, but 90 A380s for a country with less humans than a suburb of Istanbul - paints an interesting slant.

Food/Service Qatar Airways/Turkish Airlines

Over the years I've traveled primarily in Asia and the US, less so in Europe. Some airlines have left memorable impressions over the years, that I'm surprised at the age of 29 to still remember from my early days pre teenager. Singapore Airlines was way ahead of its time (pre Nintendo Gameboy days) with these game consoles they have in the wall and give you in the flight to play in your seat later.

With that said, two very recent experiences stick out.

1. I met a friend in Istanbul during fall 2010, he had just come over from Croatia. I asked him how Turkish Airlines was as I was taking them on my next journey to London. He kept mentioning the food and how it was of a quality he would go to a restaurant for - and thats even the economy class. I took economy to London and was extremely surprised, I have never had such good food in economy class in my life, the aubergine with beef and rice was really excellent, certainly restaurant quality (err umm if I say so, better than many "interesting" restaurants I've been to in London).
2. During 2009 I had to travel between Singapore and Europe, Qatar Airways had been under pricing Emirates Etihad and Gulf Air, probably as a market penetration strategy. Everything was fine from Singapore to Doha. However I later had an experience in transit, that made me strongly believe that there was little organizational connection between the transit/check in desk and the actual crew on the aircraft. Somehow from them checking my boarding pass, to me walking to the aircraft - my seat became no longer available as another customer was seated in it. To top it off, I'm still chasing them for some of my mileage credit.  But they haven't heard the last of me.