Thanks for this info. I will do my homework when booking award tickets and try to book through airports with lower fees. Also, I noticed that the taxes and fees shown on expedia.com are totally different than those shown or charged when booking directly with the airline - besides for their $5 fee; the fees directly with the airline could be significantly less than just $5. I recently had this experience when booking a CO flight for both my husband and myself. I used onepass miles for one and paid $33 in fees and TYP (which buys their tickets from expedia) for the other and paid over $75 in fees - identical classes, intineraries, and flights; I didn't gripe about the expedia fees since it was still A LOT less than paying full price!

Yes the DL bandits are!

Expedia price breaks out the Federal Excise Tax which I believe is 7.5% or in that ballpark.

US Airlines include the Federal Excise Tax in the price you see. Therefore the add-on tax and fee are lower than what Expedia shows.

Award tickets, as well as tickets bought by travel vouchers, are not subject to Federal Excise Tax.

Such variances have been discussed multiple times in the Other Credit Card forum. Do a search there you will find lots of actual calculation examples to illustrate the issue.

Of course, that Expedia price does not include Federal Excise Tax, means that when one redeem TYP ticket, one has to pay a higher tax & fee, than one would if purchase directly from airline.

[QUOTE=AndrewC75;9831217]deleted reply.

Be careful when booking through third-party engines to make sure you're booking the same fare code as the airline's web site does (or at least a fare code you can live with). Sometimes the third-party engines get "consolidator" fares which can be lower but which may sometimes not qualify for earning miles or not qualify for earning status miles or not qualify for upgrades.

These "consolidator" fares may, in turn, have lower fees simply because they were bought in bulk weeks or months earlier, when the fees might have been lower.