Singapore Airlines and low-cost subsidiary Scoot have loaded their VTL flight schedules for the summer 2022 season, with many routes picking up extra quarantine-free services, including London and Sydney.
Singapore has extended its Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) scheme, currently operating until 26th March 2022, through to late October next year, with Singapore Airlines and Scoot among the first of 24 VTL-approved airlines to confirm their flight schedules for the seven-month extension.
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The SIA Group is operating around 60% of all VTL flights into Singapore (based on March 2022 schedules), so this extended list of designated flights is likely to reflect the lion’s share of Singapore-bound quarantine-free options for the northern summer 2022 season.
Sydney and London see the biggest increase in VTL flights, including Airbus A380s in both cases, while Scoot will no longer operate VTL flights from Seoul and Kuala Lumpur.
It’s possible to get immediately confirmable Saver Suites awards on A380 designated VTL flights, including from India to Singapore and Frankfurt to Singapore. (Photo: MainlyMiles)
This early notice addition of quarantine-free flights could represent a great time to lock in future bookings or redemption tickets, while SIA still has its complimentary rebooking policy in force.
Singapore Airlines and Scoot VTL flights to October 2022
Singapore Airlines has given up maintaining its full list of designated VTL flights, instead directing customers to its flight schedule page or the booking system and simply asking them to look out for the marked services.
Low-cost subsidiary Scoot is also still working on updating its rundown, despite having loaded its VTL flights into the booking system already.
Well don’t worry – we haven’t given up listing all the eligible flights for each route and so naturally we’ve done the legwork for you and searched the entire schedule to identify the ones you’ll need to pick!
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Here’s the full list of designated flights on SIA and Scoot’s 37 VTL routes, with schedules from now until late October 2022.
We’ve also noted the key differences introduced from 27th March 2022, and you can click to expand each VTL schedule in turn for a full day of operation / timing breakdown and aircraft details.
VTL flights operated by other carriers are also shown alongside SIA and Scoot flights, where known.
Adelaide
SIA will increase its Adelaide VTL flights from 4 weekly to 5 weekly.
When you search for VTL flights with Singapore Airlines or Scoot, you should see them clearly marked as such via the website or mobile booking portals.
Most other airlines operating VTL flights to Singapore have a similar marker, or a dedicated page on their website listing which flights are designated VTL services.
All VTL flights
We have already updated our full list of designated VTL flights with these confirmed VTL schedule extensions, along with those confirmed so far by non-SIA Group airlines.
That page includes non-SIA routes like Helsinki and Nadi. It is continuously updated so do bookmark it for the latest changes and announcements.
As we mentioned above, around 40% of designated VTL flights to Singapore are operated by one of 23 carriers other than Singapore Airlines, including flights from three cities that don’t have any SIA Group service (Darwin, Helsinki and Nadi).
Finnair has yet to outline its designated VTL flights from 27th March 2022 onwards. (Photo: Finnair)
Most of these airlines have not yet confirmed their list of designated flights for the summer 2022 season, however we can expect them to extend their VTL operations with a similar pattern to their existing services for the seven-month extension of the programme, as SIA has done.
Again we’ll be updating our full list of designated VTL flights by all airlines on all routes as we receive confirmation of these non-SIA services, to give you a one-stop overview of all the quarantine-free options available from each city.
What about new VTL countries?
Just because the current VTL list will be extended until the end of October 2022 doesn’t mean there won’t be any more VTL countries added to the programme between now and then.
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Depending on the COVID-19 situation, we can expect further Australian states to open soon, with countries like Vietnam, Japan and Taiwan also likely candidates to make the list in early 2022.
Stay tuned as we’ll always bring you news of the latest VTL additions.
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Summary
We were really hoping for the designated VTL flight concept to be gone by early 2022, ideally replaced with a much more flexible system allowing fully vaccinated travellers to fly to Singapore on any flight from a VTL country without undergoing quarantine on arrival.
Unfortunately it looks like the concept is here to stay for a while, perhaps partly due to the uncertainty over the Omicron COVID-19 variant, with a confirmed extension until 29th October 2022 – the end of the IATA summer season.
Singapore Airlines operates its Airbus A350s on many VTL routes. (Photo: Maxim Grohotov / Shutterstock)
Singapore Airlines is first out of the gate with its schedule announcement for existing VTL routes, but we expect other carriers to follow with confirmation of their own schedules, which currently make up 40% of VTL flights, in due course.
Are there any plans or at least ideas for fully vaccinated people from Category 2 countries(but not VTL countries) to be able to use the VTL flights without the 14 days stay in VTL country?
Thank you for that. And hello from Vancouver. I’m a happy camper today.
Hi Andrew, I noticed that Scoot website shows flights up till 29th October only, anything beyond that shows “No flights”. I’m looking specifically at melbourne. Do you happen to know if this is a cause for concern i.e. Scoot cease to operate beyond that? Or if it’s not, do you know when this will be updated? Their customer service is practically non-existent.
SIN-SEA will continue to stop in YVR it seems. My flights in April and May both stop in YVR.
Thanks they snuck that one in there last minute! Corrected
Are there any plans or at least ideas for fully vaccinated people from Category 2 countries(but not VTL countries) to be able to use the VTL flights without the 14 days stay in VTL country?
Not that I’m aware of.
If I fly Delhi -singapore on VTL flight, do I need to wait 24hrs in Singapore and get tested again to board Singapore – Sydney FEPO flight.
What about SQ 21 EWR to SIN on the ULR? It looks as though there will be double daily nonstops from the NYC area?
EWR not currently marked as a VTL service, but watch this space.
Thank you for that. And hello from Vancouver. I’m a happy camper today.
Hi Andrew, I noticed that Scoot website shows flights up till 29th October only, anything beyond that shows “No flights”. I’m looking specifically at melbourne. Do you happen to know if this is a cause for concern i.e. Scoot cease to operate beyond that? Or if it’s not, do you know when this will be updated? Their customer service is practically non-existent.
I suspect they simply haven’t loaded their winter schedule for that route yet.
You only need to quarantine until you take the test, you are free while you wait for results.
Reference:
https://www.covid-19.sa.gov.au/travel/international-travel