FR pricing??

[320JI]

i'm not a FR basher as i've used them lots and never had a problem and take the view you get what you pay for.......however....

can someone explain how a 99p flight from stn to dub for two incurs £47 in taxes however a £0.00p flight for two only incurs 19.75??

surely your departure taxes are the same or am i out of touch.....

anyone understand and can offer a reasonable explaination?

[modelflyer]

I also use Ryanair and had noticed what you describe. I think they can make the taxes/fees amount to any figure they want, which gives rise to the anomaly you have observed. We just have to look at the final total cost of the flight and decide if it is a price we are prepared to pay.

As I often travel from Luton to Murcia and back for about the same price as a train ticket to London I am not complaining. I also find them very punctual and reliable.

[nickmo]

Tax on tickets is seemingly an inpenetrable world - but are you aware that if you cancel a ticket that states 'non-refundable' you can still get the tax, fees and charges back?

Bit of info here off the Air Transport Users Council if this might gain a few brownie points and pay for the airport parking for the next time...:

http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/306/Press%20Notice%20APD%20Refs%20amended.pdf

'.....airlines rarely voluntarily refund taxes, fees and charges to passengers who do not travel. You have to ask......'

[Avman]

The reality is not so simple nickmo. When handling refunds they slap on "administrative" costs which almost completely negate any moneys you may be due from tax refunds. Yet another airline scam (not exclusive to RYR may I add).

[42psi]

To understand it you need to revise your definition of "taxes".

For FR "taxes" mean any cost or charge which they may pay to operate. That means to airport or handling agent as well as the usual "govt. tax".

So costs/charges that others might refer to as "overheads" are re-defined as "taxes".


So the actual "taxes" charged depend on how FR choose to define and allocate their costs and what they choose to regard as a tax for your ticket. They can vary per ticket/per flight/per day or according to any other definition.

[10secondsurvey]

Not sure if Ryanair do it, but I seem to remember that on the Flybe site, they state words to the effect, that flybe may pay a fraction or some of the taxes, depending upon the fare.

In other words, the carrier can opt to 'pay' these made up charges, depedning upon the current pricing and seat availability etc..

May be someone else can clarify, but it would certainly explain the wild variation in taxes and fees, for very similar flights.

[Seat62K]

I, too, think that Ryanair sometimes opts to pay, for example, the £10 UK Air Passenger Duty rather than pass it on to the customer. What this means, obviously, is that when one flies from Stansted to Belfast and back, say, for £2.02 (including the debit card fee) or from Stansted to Dublin and return for nothing in effect Ryanair is subsidising you to travel as, presumably, it still has to pay the APD in addition to a PSC at each end.

[PAXboy]

FR may be cited here but others do it. We have had numerous threads in here on this subject and all the usual suspects crop up every time. FR work on the well founded plan that the punters will still reckon that the flight is cheap - which it often is.

Two years ago was planning a short break in The Netherlands and thought I'd use up some old Airmiles (the UK proprietary type) to go from LGW. The taxes were at a certain level, so I checked the exact same flights on BA, pricing as if I was to pay for the whole thing. You will be astounded to learn that Airmiles charged more for 'taxes' and that, naturally, their people could not tell me why.

We went on EZY by paying as it was cheaper than giving up Airmiles and paying their exorbitant 'taxes'.

[Seat62K]

I agree, PAXboy. I have bmi Destinations Miles and BA Miles which, frankly, are not worth using on short-haul routes. I think the fact that airlines charge so much for customers to redeem their miles is one reason why some are not willing to consolidate fuel surcharges into basic ticket prices. It has not always been this way. I remember making several completely free trips in the past from Stansted to Amsterdam on klmuk using Flying Dutchman miles.
(P.S. Aren't Airmiles redemptions now inclusive of taxes, fees and charges? I don't collect them so I do not know.)