Hot on the heels of Rex announcing cut-price fares on its new Sydney-Melbourne route, Virgin Australia is following suit with matching offers of its own: $49 in economy and $199 in business class during March.

These special fares will be on sale until Sunday 28 February 2021 but are expected to sell out quickly. Virgin Australia has also launched one-way economy fares between Sydney-Melbourne from as low as $79, for travel 1 April until 15 December 2021, on sale until 2 March 2021.

To provide travellers peace of mind when booking, Virgin Australia has also announced that it will extend its flexible booking policy, waiving change and cancellation fees for travel up to 31 January 2022, for bookings made by 30 April 2021. This matches Qantas’ announcement earlier this week.

A Virgin Australia spokesperson said: “We’ve been inspired to look at new ways to push the envelope when it comes to stimulating the market and getting Australians back in the skies again.

“We were the first Australian airline to introduce COVID-19 booking flexibility, have put more than 2 million seats on sale in the last week, and rolled out an informative health and wellbeing series on our social media channels to assure travellers are comfortable when they next fly.

“Today, we’ve raised the bar even higher – matching some of the lowest airfares in the market – complete with checked-baggage, seat selection, double Velocity Points on eligible bookings and of course, our award-winning service.”

More information about Virgin’s flexible booking policy is available here.

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