How many of us have booked a flight with a low cost airline, lured by billboards advertising flights for only 1p? Then only to find that taxes, fees and charges applied on booking have pushed the price up by several thousand percent. Annoying isn’t it? In response to consumer complaints of being confused, mislead and frequently ripped off by airlines, new EU regulations have now come into force which require airlines within the EU to include all compulsory taxes and surcharges in published ticket prices. This means you’ll have a more realistic idea of how much you’ll be paying without having to go through the whole booking process.

Added to the annoyance of hidden charges was the automatic inclusion of other optional surcharges – such as priority boarding, checking in of baggage and insurances. So, unless you ‘unticked’ the boxes you would end up paying for them – whether you wanted them or not. The new regs mean these ‘extras’ must be clearly and unambiguously set out on an ‘opt in’ basis, giving you more control over and awareness of what you actually end up paying for.

Improvement?

So, has the situation improved? Well, airlines can no longer advertise flights for 1p or even £1.00, as the taxes etc will be a minimum of at least £10.00. However, the price you see on the billboard is still often very far from the price you’ll end up paying. Airlines will always quote the cheapest possible fare available at some point during the dates specified. Chances are that this price will not be available on the day you want to fly. In addition, fares quoted are nearly always one-way, which is just as unrealistic as you’ll probably want to come back at some point. Thirdly the inclusion of taxes and surcharges does not include the controversial payment handling fees, which most airlines charge for debit as well as credit cards. In the case of Ryan Air, this is currently £4 per adult, per one way flight!

So, are we getting ripped off? A quick sweep of a handful of the UK’s most popular budget airlines shows us how much we pay in compulsory and optional surcharges.

Ryan Air

Debit / credit card charges (per adult fare, per one-way flight): £4
Seat allocation / priority boarding (per one-way flight): £6
Airport check in (per one-way flight): £4
Checked baggage (per bag, per one way flight): £8.00
Infant fee (per infant per one way flight): £16
Sport equipment / Musical instrument (per item per one way flight): £25
Call centre charges: 10p per minute

Easyjet

Debit / credit card charges: £1.75 / £4.95
Seat allocation / priority boarding (per one-way flight): £4
Airport check-in: N/A
Checked baggage (per bag per one way flight): £7.50
Infant fee (per infant per one way flight): £10
Sport equipment (per item per one way flight): £16.50
Call centre charges: 65p per minute

BMIBaby

Debit / credit card charges: £5 / £7
Seat allocation / priority boarding (per one-way flight): £5.99
Airport check in (per one-way flight): £3.99
Checked baggage (per bag per one-way flight): £7.99
Infant fee (per infant per one-way flight): £15.00
Sport equipment / Musical instrument (per item per one way flight): £17.99 – £24.99
Call centre charges: 10p per minute

Take care!

Despite the new regs requiring airlines to provide optional extras as opt in (i.e. not automatically included), we have found that priority boarding, baggage and insurance were routinely included as standard.