KLM and Air France flyers will soon be able to get added help from within India. Air France has announced plans to set up a joint call centre for Air France and KLM in Delhi, the national capital of India.

According to reports, the call centre is mainly aimed at servicing the Indian market. The centre is expected to come up by May this year and will handle reservations, claims and frequent flier programmes.

Signifcantly, the call centre in Delhi would only be the third frm the Air France stable in the Asia-Pacific region. It already has only two in the region at Sydney and Guangzhou in China. The airline also has plans to increase its flights out of India, which has emerged as one of the two most important markets in the Asia Pacific region. The other most prominent market in the region is China.

With Air France boosting its capacity out of India by 27 per cent in October 2006, the Indian market had been a major segment for the airline. Air France and KLM together offer 42 weekly frequencies to Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad and Mumbai.

It has been found that the Indian market had shown consistent as well as considerable double-digit growth during the past three years. Passengers load factors in January stood at around 90 per cent, said reports quoting Air France officials.