Why are taxes so high on BA int'l flights, but not on easyJet int'l flights?
 

This is a serious question about UK taxes on international flights. I'm not trying to compare BA to easyJet.

I priced two economy class flights today, one on British Airways from Baltimore to London (Heathrow), and one on easyJet from London (Luton) to Amsterdam. The UK taxes alone on the BA flight total £31.90 (plus an additional BA surcharge of $42), while the TOTAL cost of the easyJet flight is £35.98 (only £10 of which is taxes - presumably some UK and some NL).

Why are the UK taxes significantly higher on a British Airways international flight versus an easyJet international flight?

British Airways return flight
BWI to/from LHR April 6 - April 13
class: economy (World Traveller)
ticket: $316
US gov't taxes & fees: $52.15
British Airways YQ Surcharge: $42.00
UK Passenger Service Charge: £11.90
UK Air Passengers Duty: £20.00

EasyJet return flight
LUT to/from AMS April 6 - April 13
class: none?
ticket: £25.98
all taxes & fees: £10.00

I feel the same way with KLM! In my opinion, in comparison, BA taxes are pretty much mid-tier.

For example, for a SIN-LHR-SIN flight, BA taxes are about GBP65 and KLM taxes are about GBP100 (note, rough and ready conversions from singapore dollars)

All these taxes are just a compete mystery.. Evil scheme by airlines to pad thier earnings perhaps??

I can think of one word : HEATHROW.

For some reason , London airports Heathrow and Gatwick charge very high fees and this is passed onto the passenger.

International overseas taxes are also double that of international European taxes . But enjoy the 'lower' rates when you can. I understand that the international fees are set to raise even higher in the next few years.

Well, someone has got to pay for the 5th Terminal at Heathrow!

Taxes at Heathrow are substantially higher than at Luton.

BA also includes some other spurious charges, such as its fuel surcharge, in with taxes. If you try to book the same BA flight on aa.com you'll find it is cheaper because AA doesn't add on one of BA's funny extras.

But is this difference not because BA is a direct flight and the KLM flight is via AMS so you get stung for the taxes there too?

P

Although only a small part of the answer, you're not quite comparing like with like.

The true UK government tax - the Air Passenger Duty - is charged at the international rate for LON-WAS but at the domestic/European rate for LON-AMS. There was litigation about this; it is illegal for the UK to charge more for an EU flight than for a UK domestic flight. In many ways, flights to the EU must be treated more as domestic than international.

Yeah - Ryanair! :D

Only in part, since KLM have made some 'interesting' decisions, such as introducing a charge for 'use of the booking systems' that apply to all customers, however they book. Co-incidentally enough, this occurred round about the same time as they announced reductions in their (pre-tax/charges) fares. Not, of course, that I'd suggest a link between the two...

It can also be interesting to compare their taxes and charges between paid flights and award flights.

Yep, taxes have become dear to KLM FT-ers hearts, because you pay more in tax for an award ticket than you would if you bought a ticket on the same flight.. they have also been caught miscalculating taxes on a few occasions, just to add to confidence in their abilities. Strangely, the miscalculations don't appear to have been in the passengers favour :( AMS is also quite an expensive airport to fly through, because in addition to the PSC, the Netherlands air duty, there is also a noise tax (if I whisper, can i be exempt? ;))

Back to the original question. We have discussed this quite a lot on the KLM board. The non-LCCs tend to put a lot of extra charges into their taxes (including airline ones :mad: ). The LCC's tend to include these in ticket price. Also, we know at some airports, some of the LCC's have negotiated discounts of the PSC due at some airports, but will not want their competitors (and no doubt the airport will not want other airlines) to know exactly what rate the are paying. Hence, it's very rare to find a PSC included in the taxes and charges of a LCC, as then they would have to provide this information.

Has the silly OLCI/SSCI problem been sorted with aa.com tickets yet? It does put me off booking it there.

Are we Brits the only ones to be robbed by the Chancellor if we happen to turn left on a plane or are there other countries that charge different rates of departure tax depending on which cabin you are ticketed in? I reckon we're the only ones. Thank god for the Channel Tunnel! :D

Australia for one.

Pakistan for another. F,J,Y, would you believe!

But Australia does not charge different rates of tax in F J Y if I'm not mistaken.

On second thoughts I think you're right. The taxes have gone up so much it just feels that part of them must be a premium class supplement.

I can confirm turning left on a CSA ATR for a PRG-WAW segment. Didn't pay extra tax to seat in the rear cabin. :D

Try comparing taxes, charges, surcharges, sursurcharges, captain's bacon sandwich etc where BA and EZ use the same airport, e.g. LGW. EZ's charge for flight plus extras can often be less than BA's charge for extras alone.

RJB's second paragraph is the answer. BA choose to class as extras charges included in some other airlines' fares.

Sure, at some of the fields with a hut that LiarAir use, but certainly not at LGW for example, where easyJet must be the biggest operator by flight movements and passengers by now, having overtaken BA some time ago.

I'm sure BAA (operator of LGW) offer EZ no more or less favourable terms for psc's than to BA, so how come BA's flights from LGW attract such extra charges which EZ manage to absorb?

Well EZ doesn't absorb them - EZ just doesn't state them explicitly like BA does as part of their taxes. EZ (as you state) at LGW are probably paying full PSC - but their policy means that PSC is included in the ticket price, while BA excludes it from the ticket price, and puts it in the extras bit. Passenger still has to pay for them, one way or the other. However, EZ is a LCC - that just doesn't relate to ticket price, it's means they strive to keep all their costs down as far as possible. So I would imagine that a lot of the non internationally mandated charges, such as internal airline security charges are lower for EZ than for BA - hence how they keep ticket price cost down for some of the time.

I expect that factors like this contribute to my experience, which is that it's seldom been significantly cheaper to buy an EZY or RYR ticket for a route I need to go on, at the time I need to travel at, than to buy a BA ticket. For the extra money with BA, I get ...

Yes, we agree (except I doubt that security charges for EZ are significantly lower than for BA).

I have pointed out in other posts examples where EZ's total price including extras is lower than BA's charge for extras alone. Nobody has been able to explain that, other than BA charging extra for costs which EZ (and some others) include in the basic fare.

It's roughly 80% cheaper for the airline to be based at Luton or another 'low cost' airport compared with Heathrow. Also BA dont charge for Credit Card etc..


Dom.

Perhaps so, but my example was BA ex LGW and EZ ex LGW.

Well, KLM's strategy over here in Singapore is to portray themselves as one of the cheapest european options for the SIN-Europe route. In fact, off-hand, I can't think of any cheaper european airline for this route. BUT, their taxes are pretty much deleting any price advantage they might have. :td:

That said, while I can understand having to pay higher taxes because I take an indirect flight, KLM's taxes are still pretty much the highest amongst all other other in-direct options.Here's a list of recently checked taxes for the SIN-London route:

All rates in Singapore dollars (it's about 1 GBP=3.1 SGD)
BA = $192
SQ = $210 (strangely different from BA...)
CX = $204
Turkish Air = $234 (this is a SIN-BKK-IST-LHR trip)
KLM = $301
Emirates = $150 (Gatwick)
AF = $361
(oh, and SIN-AMS on KLM has taxes of $168)

OK, going to stop now that that post is getting more and more OT
(PS. rather sadly, for my next trip up to the UK, I'm not going to be able to fly BA because my trip involves the UK, Ukraine, Romania & Turkey, and using London as a hub for that sort of travel ex-singapore just doesn't make sense.. so Turkish Airways here I come! SIN-BKK-IST-LHR **sob**)

Example
 

I have just (possibly stupidly) booked a 1 way flight from AMS - LGW.
The 2 options were:
EZ departing 20.55 - €135 plus €7.50 "taxes and charges"
BA departing 2015 - €129 plus €32.45 "taxes/fees/charges"

It does seem stupid for BA to price this way. Everybody knows that BA have a better product than Easyjet, and most don't mind paying a little extra for it. But it seems that BA are now behaving in a more no frills way than EZ...

Funny that you mention the LGW-AMS route. One way fares on BA start at £52.90 (£34.00 + £18.90 tax/charges) which is much less than the full fare single on that route. If only BA offered discounted one ways on UK domestic routes.

BA taxes are high even in similar routes.
 

I made a reservation recently using AA miles for an award reservation from

LON-MAA return ticket. I noticed almost 100% increase in taxes with BA.

1. AA charged me $56
2. BA charging for the same award $108.56

I think BA is adding too many junk fees or their own service charges on top of the taxes.

Prasad

... and the fuel "surcharges" are increasing by a further 3 Pounds or 5 Euros soon (see my quoted article on the observer of yesterday).

I didn't know you could get cheap one-ways on any BA shorthaul. This must be relatively new? And unadvertised? It looks like it's only on some routes. AMS and BRU have them, PAR does not. Maybe it's a trial, with a fuller rollout to follow.

As forseen by Globaliser some time ago ^

I think LGW is feeling the bite from EZ on a couple of routes. A couple of the tourist routes have them as well- I first noted those about 6 months ago, AMS was a suprise a couple of weeks back.

It can only be a matter of time before they offer o/w N,V fares etc on all routes from LGW. I suspect its near the top of Willie Wonkas in-tray.

Did I? If so, I'd forgotten. I mustn't take credit for something that someone else said, which is much more likely!The cheap one-way fares are also available ex-LHR, at least according to ba.com. For example, BA0434 LHR-AMS 4 May 2005 11:35: £34.00+£23.40=£57.40.

So it's a bit wider than an LGW-specific response.

With regard to those one way fares to AMS, why are taxes more at LHR than LGW? ex-LHR (£23.40)and ex-LGW(£18.90). I thought APD and PSC are the same at both airports. Or are there additional charges at LHR?

Regularly flying LON-EDI return I've often asked a similar question re UK domestic - LON-EDI-LON non-fare additions are: LGW-EDI-LGW £36.10, LHR-EDI-LHR £38.20, LCY-EDI-LCY £46.10 :confused: