Air NZ slashes fares: domestic flights for $9, international travel for $99

Deals like this don't stick around for long. Photo / File

Air New Zealand has unveiled more cheap fare deals, with domestic flights from $9 and international trips from $150.

The airline is offering 500 domestic flights for $9 one-way from this morning.

Also on sale is 150 international flights available from $99 and include one-way flights from Christchurch to the Gold Coast and Fiji.

There will also be reduced fares to Asia, Australia and the Pacific Islands as well.

From Auckland, $299 fares to Honolulu and $199 to Tahiti one-way are up for grabs.

Grabaseat is also offering direct flights to Singapore for $799 return and $999 return to Tokyo.

Air New Zealand chief revenue officer Cam Wallace said: "If you're looking to escape the winter weather or spend time with friends or family across the country, this is your chance. We're expecting these deals will fly off the site."

The Grabaseat website turned 13 last month, with Air New Zealand offering a range of bargain birthday deals at the time.

The website crashed due to heavy demand earlier this year when $1 deals saw thousands of Kiwis flock to the site to secure flights.

Jetstar has also been getting in on the action, offering deals to match Air New Zealand when they run promotions in a price war that has been good news for consumers.

John Willson from First Travel Group told the Herald that Air NZ would have launched the deals after noticing a "soft spot" in their competitors' offerings.

Consumers were now "trained" for such promotions and knew that "they just had to wait for the next one to come along".

Willson also said that consumers no longer felt they needed to jump on every promotion, knowing that a deal would be available when they wanted to fly in what he called the "Briscoes effect".

Willson suggested that it would be a challenge for Jetstar to match Air New Zealand's fares, describing the $9 deals as "pretty stupid", noting that the money "wouldn't even start the engine, let alone fly it."