Mumbai, Oct 5 (IANS) Air Arabia Tuesday launched a service to facilitate its Indian passengers to buy tickets and apply for visa to the United Arab Emirates online.

"We now connect 13 Indian destinations to the UAE, and the launch of this visa service will help accommodate the significant increase in visa requests from across these centres," said A.K. Nizar, Head of Commercial Department, Air Arabia.

Air Arabia lauched the visa service and a call centre in partnership with IVS Global Services.

"Through the new service, passengers can buy tickets and apply for the visa online. The launch of the call centre will also facilitate individuals and travel agents in visa service. The all India call centre number is 9223330060," Nizar added.

Air Arabia is also offering convenient value added services to make the entire experience of getting a UAE visa hassle free.

"Passengers can now choose to have all the documents collected from their residence for a nominal fee. There will also be a SMS tracking system that ensures that passengers who opt for that service would get timely updates on their application status on their mobiles," Nizar said.

Air Arabia started operations in October 2003 and currently operates a total fleet of 23 new Airbus A320 aircraft, serving 65 routes from three hubs in UAE, Morocco and Egypt.