I have to go to Europe on a business trip in several weeks. I was amazed at how much tax there is on airline tickets now. When did this start? Was I just unaware of this?
My guess is that 911 provoked a number of security upgrades that had to be paid by someone
Declan
One would hope that passengers absorb all expenses incurred while flying.
Otherwise taxpayers will have to bail out the airlines every 5 years when they go bankrupt because they spend more than they take in.
Do these extra charges also include fuel surcharges ? These particular “extras” have risen dramatically because of the rise in crude prices.
I suspect taxes and fuel surcharges etc have spiralled upward because airline costs have spiralled up but the airlines are reluctant to increase their advertised fair. I’m a firm believer in advertising one inclusive fair to facilitate price comparisons, but what would I know?
I for one would like a breakdown of the taxes on the ticket.
You mean beyond “International Taxes”? A quick Google search brought up this article from 2006. Here’s one from Google Answers.
Ticket taxes broken out, sample trip Dulles to Heathrow, Saturday stay included, total in Canadian funds, cause that’s wherre I’m pricing, but you get the point.
BASE FARE EQUIV AMT TAXES TOTAL
USD566.00 CAD566.00 397.52XT CAD963.52ADT
30.80US 5.50YC 7.00XY 5.00XA
2.50AY 77.93GB 34.29UB 230.00YQ
4.50XF
US, YC, XY, XA, AY are all United States government taxes (immigration, security tax, etc).
GB and UB are British taxes.
YQ, your biggie, is the fuel surcharge, not included in the base fare.
XF is the airport fee for Dulles.
Will be able to respond more after work today, or on the weekend, but am subscribing.
In principle, I agree that having the total price broken down to constituent costs makes it easier to find out what you’re paying for. OTOevery product or service includes a number of component costs which contribute to the total price.
As an example, suppose you buy a train or subway ticket. The price advertised is the total price inclusive of all costs. The company providing the service also has to pay costs for things such as fuel, track maintenance, station maintenance etc. Yet, they don’t break down the fare into its constituents, at least not with the same degree of precision as airlines do. In the air traffic business, it has become customary to exclude as many components as possible from the fare itself, in order to use a seemingly low price in advertising - which, of course, amounts to considerably more money once these additional costs, which should have been taken into account to begin with, are added. It’s not really deceptive advertising, and there are certainly more doubtful practices in other industries than this, but it’s not really ideal either. What the customer gets is one integrated product - a trip from one point to another. IMO, the companies should advertise the price as one integrated consideration for this integrated product, as other industries do.
I just meant a breakdown for this thread.
Thanks for the breakdown.