timbre

I used AAdvantage miles to purchase a ticket for a friend in Colombia to meet me in Spain on Iberia Airlines. I paid points PLUS $277.30 in "Taxes and Carrier-Imposed Fees" -- this is all the AA receipt says. When my friend tried to depart from Medellin, Colombian, Iberia forced him to pay $89,100 COP in departure taxes. I have traveled many times in and out of Medellin on points and paid tickets and any departure tax was always in my ticket cost.

I suspect this tax was in the ticket price but for whatever reason they could not see it or chose not to see it.

Has anyone had this happen before? Any thoughts on how to get this money back. Truthfully, it is so little money that it is hardly worth much effort but it is a little bit about the principal. Any chance I could get AA to give me back the money that they collected. I suspect getting Iberia to be helpful will be like talking to a wall.

shd9

Get the Iberia Record Locator (PNR), go to Finnair using that PNR and last name, send a copy of e-ticket to your email address.

There will be a breakdown of all taxes and fees

coolcoil

I'm a resident of Colombia and therefore subject to the resident departure tax. AA has always collected the tax as part of the ticket charge on any itinerary I've ever booked that originated in Colombia, and I would think they would have done the same here. Though, the fact that the flight was on another airline may change that, as the individual airline is responsible for paying the tax and reconciling the books with the government.

So, the first place I would go is to your AA receipt and look at the tax breakout to see if they did indeed collect it.

timbre

Thanks for this information. This might explain it since I personally booked the ticket from the USA with my USA account and at the time of booking they would not know the residency of the passenger since they do not ask it during the booking process.

timbre

Thanks. I have the breakdown. How do I interpret the codes?

Herb687

It's been several years since I've been to Colombia but do they still have that process where you first have to get a departure tax exemption stamp from a separate DIAN desk in the airport before checking in for your international flight?

xliioper

Colombia Resident Exit Tax Timbre (DG)
89.100 COP would be about $28 USD.

coolcoil

No - that system was scrapped two or three years ago. Now non-residents don't have to do anything if their itinerary originated outside of Colombia. If it originated inside Colombia then the airline probably collected the resident departure tax and they will need to refund it to you, but you don't have to go anywhere. From time to time the AA check in agent will start the refund process when they don't realize that I am a resident.

tuxedo66

Having just flown out of Bogota, I just wanted to give an update to readers on the process for getting the Colombia Resident Exit Tax refunded. This showed on my ticket as USD21.90 with a tax code of “DG”.

After my boarding pass was issued, I asked where I would get this refunded. In my broken Spanish I said “Donde reimbolso impuesto exit residencia?”. That was enough for her to understand me. Even with Avianca, some staff don’t speak too much English.

She checked our passport entry stamps to ensure that we hadn’t stayed longer than the period that would disqualify us from a refund (60 days maybe).

She called up a supervisor who came with a little bag which had money in it. They reprinted our boarding passes and marked them as VOID. On the back, they stamped an acknowledgement for us to sign. They also stamped and noted the refund in our passports against our immigration entry stamp.

Even though we were airline staff travelling on standby with no guarantee we would get on the flight, we got our money back right there and then. I guess they knew we would be leaving the country in the next few days even if we couldn’t get on today.

Once airside, we changed the pesos we received into USD as we were flying to the USA. The airside departure money changer near Gate 38 has excellent rates when they sell USD.

Note that the arrival money changer has a really bad rate when selling COP. Use the ATM instead if you can!