PRC Airport Fees
 

I'm amused by the only Chinese surcharge on my $95 flight within China:

People's Republic of China Airport Fee - $1.50 :D

Not at all like the surcharges flying within some Euro countries.

IIRC, the airport construction fee is 90 for international flights and 50 for domestic, while YQ is around 150 (varies based on date of travel and distance of flight). This means that those super cheap tickets we used to boast about now cost $70+.

More like $15.

The surcharges are too much IMO. Not fair on airlines like Spring.

it's usually 200 rmb each way, which is some 30$ or so. your fare is 600 rmb ai, so I'll guess that either you got a very very decent SH - BJ fare or you're flying to a nearby city.

the fees are especially annoying when i want to use a connection and it requires double taxes and fees.

i keep wanting to try out spring, but the taxes don't quite make it cheap enough. Tsn-Sha is around 300 and fees, but i can grab a train for same price or a real airline for 100 more with real luggage allowance

I'm pretty sure that it's still y50; it's the fuel surcharge that fluctuates (currently y150 on PEK-SHA).

Definitely not correct. The "Airport Construction Fee" (which is essentially Departure tax) is RMB 50 for all domestic flights. Which is a lot more than $1.50. Not sure what it is you are looking at--I assume your ticket was not issued in China, since it is priced in $. Perhaps your airline/agent is just mixing around the various taxes at will and ascribing their own amounts to the different statutory line items?

The fuel charge on domestic Chinese flights has recently been changed to either RMB 80 or RMB 150 depending on distance. That's in addition to the ACF/departure tax. So, assuming your ticket is for a shorter journey, the taxes/fees at current exchange rates would be about $20 of that $96.50 total (I'm assuming USD is the unit). $31 if for a journey over 800 km/480 miles. Maybe those numbers don't look so amusing now...

The airport construction fee has been 50/90 for the past ~20 years (i.e. long before Spring came into being). Meanwhile, YQ goes directly to the airlines themselves. What is unfair about this arrangement (apart from the fact that one mentally needs to tack an additional amount onto quoted fares)?

The PEK to HGH ; fuel surcharge at 150 rmb + the 50 rmb for airport tax. So a total of 200 rmb tax's for only a 700 mile flight. its about 20-30 % of the total ticket now. The $ 100 short day 1 way legs are about gone.

I think the hike in YQ domestic was determined when global oil was up at the $100-ish mark, even if the implementation on tickets was lagging behind. What will be interesting to watch is whether the fuel surcharges will be lowered at some point, assuming global oil prices remain where they are now. I don't know the timing of the Chinese gov't/airlines doing their forward fuel purchasing and fuel hedging, and what they are locked into.

I do think that with all the factors involved (not just fuel) plus currency exchange, that those cheap domestic fares are now the exception not the rule. I find flying in China to be very rarely a bargain these days.

I thought they dropped a few months ago... could have sworn that y190 was in effect for a while.

Not exactly. A few months ago they were RMB 130 for short journeys and RMB 190 for longer journeys, which was itself an increase from previous of RMB 160. So the new RMB 200 is actually an increase of RMB 10. What I can't remember is whether the old breakpoint was flight distance 800 km, which is what new breakpoint is. I don't recall any drop this year.

I was talking about the fuel surcharge, not the fuel surcharge plus the airport construction fee. The former seems to have fallen from y190 to y150.

Check your tickets again. My flights earlier this year were RMB 190 total = RMB 50 ACF + RMB 140 fuel. The only exception was a shortie I did from Beijing-Elianhaote which was RMB 130 total (50 + 80). I have never seen/heard of a domestic ticket this year with a fuel surcharge of RMB 190 by itself. Although I didn't deal with any really long flights such as BJ-Urumqi where maybe there was a third level of surcharge.

Unfortunately, I have none to check because I usually hand the receipts over to someone else (or simply toss them). In any event, whether YQ is 80, 140, 150, or 190 doesn't make a whole lot of difference to me because all of it is revenue for the airline. In other words, if demand goes slack, the airlines could compensate by offering 1.2折 fares.

It has always been 800 km.
http://www.china.com.cn/economic/txt...t_21971316.htm
or
http://fc.news365.com.cn/wxpd/caijin...02_3100946.htm
etc.