It’s a little known fact that once you click “purchase” for your airline flight, you’ve automatically purchased non-refundable government taxes and fees. If you need to cancel your flight at the last minute due to an emergency, then you may be surprised to find you can’t get the money for your taxes and fees back. In one case, a traveler wound up paying for a flight he didn’t use because this non-refundable portion of the ticket went to pay for air traffic control, a passenger facility charge for airport improvements and post-9/11 security fees. The next time you book airline tickets, here are some other costs to consider.
Many people complain about the cost of airline flight tickets these days. One complaint is that “taxes and fees keep going up.” Some of these airline ticket fees are automatically added on, while others are completely avoidable. For instance, you will not be able to avoid some of the airport security fee taxes, such as the 9/11 Security Fee ($10), the Passenger Facility Charges ($18), the Federal Domestic Flight Segment Fee ($3.50 each way), the U.S. International Departure tax ($15.40 per international departure), the US International Arrival tax ($15.40), the US Customs fee ($5), the Immigration fee ($7) and an Animal and Plant Health Inspection fee ($5).
For a list of avoidable airline flight fees, visit www.usatoday.com/money/industries/travel/2009-06-22-chart-airline-fees_N.htm. If you want to truly find cheap flight tickets, then you’re going to have to make some concessions. In the past, you may have been able to choose any economy flight seat for one price, but today’s flier will pay for an aisle or window seat and for an emergency exit row seat on US Airways, British Airways, United and Spirit. In the good old days, your holiday flight fares would have still been expensive, but they wouldn’t have had the extra “holiday surcharge” that American, United, Delta and US Airways have added to November 29, January 2 and January 3 flights.
According to CBS News Travel Editor Peter Greenberg, there are several ways to avoid airline flight fees and surcharges. Packing lighter will save you a lot of stress. If that’s not possible, then you may want to consider finding a courier like UPS or FedEx to send your goods. If you’re sending an unaccompanied minor, try to book a nonstop flight (to avoid paying -0 per connection). If you might need to change your flight time, learn the standby rules to avoid the -0 ticket change fee. It’s important to remember that, despite these optional fees, flight fares have remained relatively consistent since the nineties. Many airlines are struggling just to stay afloat, given the increasingly high fuel costs. So the next time you bring that overweight bag, consider how much more it’s costing the airline carrier to fly it.
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