[Anonymous]

[BAGoldcard]

BRITISH AIRWAYS FUEL SURCHARGE CHANGES

Following a further review in response to continuing rising oil prices, British Airways will restructure its fuel surcharge for tickets sold in its First, Club World, World Traveller Plus and Club Europe cabins.

With effect from Thursday June 19, 2008 the fuel surcharge will differ by cabin to reflect some of the additional costs per passenger associated with carrying customers in premium cabins.

The current fuel surcharge level will remain in place for all long haul economy World Traveller and short haul economy Euro Traveller tickets.

Willie Walsh, British Airways chief executive, said: “Recent unprecedented oil price rises are putting pressure on the whole aviation industry. For British Airways, fuel is expected to overtake employee costs this year to become our largest cost. We expect our fuel bill for the year to rise from just over £2 billion to more than £3 billion. Therefore we believe it is now appropriate to spread some of this significant additional cost among those passengers travelling in cabins with fewer seats, using more space and benefiting from larger baggage allowances, as we burn more fuel per passenger to fly them.”

For example: long haul over 9 hours will be:

World Traveller £109

World Traveller Plus £121

Club and First £133

[VintageKrug]

Couldn’t find this mentioned on ba.com, but there is quite a bit of detail on http://www.batraveltrade.com

New Fuel Surcharges for sales in the UK from 19 June:

All charges shown are per sector. Return charge is double eg GBP16 (GBP32 for a return)

Shorthaul & Domestic
Economy: GBP16
Club Eur: GBP20
Longhaul under 9 hours
Economy: GBP78
WT Plus: GBP88
Club Wld & First: GBP98
Longhaul 9 hours and over
Economy: GBP109 (except to Australia which is GBP129.50)
WT Plus: GBP121 (except to Australia which is GBP141.50)
Club Wld & First: GBP133 (except to Australia which is GBP153.50)

Note the extra charges for Australia flights which I have not seen before – they are clearly feeling the fuel pain on these extra long sectors. Used to be lumped in with the “above 9 hours” flight previously, so a double whammy for them.

I checked my receipt from a booking made on 20 January; was £256.50 in fees/tax for a J rtn.

The same flights now price up online at a massive £403.80 in taxes and fees – and that’s without the above increases….!

So the taxes and fees element has already doubled in the past five months…….and set to further increase…….a very worrying trend.

🙁

[travelworld]

Why oh why are airlines allowed to use the tag “fuel surcharge”? In common with many of the extras levied on airfares it’s not a “surcharge” at all. It’s a fare increase. \When you go round the supermarket you don’t select goods labelled with one price only to find they are increased at the till. Why should airlines be any different?

[GoonerLondon]

Actually – Fuel charges can be quite convenient on non flexible fares. With BA, upon cancellation, all the extras are refunded. Considering the base fare on some routes is only bout 30% of the total – it makes changing plans a lot less painful in the wallet.

[IanDLang]

I don’t mind paying extra for a fare when it is clearly justified as it is in an unavoidable increase in fuel costs. What is annoying and in my opinion unjustified is that redemption flights incur this surcharge as well. I think BA and other carriers should make it clear that they do not give “free” flights anymore and that the passenger is expected to pay a substantial proportion of the fare.

[jttully]

It will be interesting to see what happens with Airmiles – i believe they now include taxes and charges within their redemption rates (750 for Zone 1 flights, 1500 for Zone 2, etc) – will they now have to increase these rates to take into consideration the fuel surcharges?

[VintageKrug]

From today, it will cost a not inconsiderable £451.80 in taxes and fees to redeem 200,000 BA Miles for an exUK rtn in Club World to Sydney.

That’s a already 70% increase since January 2008.

[AussieM]

Air Miles, have lost value quicker than Northern Rock in the last few yrs! You could part use miles for a flight from 100 miles before, now its 350. It also use to be only 450 miles to zone 1 say Amsterdam, now its 750.
Its also harder to accrue miles with all retailers.
They also are craftily wiping out options with other airlines, eg KLM or VLM to Amsterdam from LHR/LCY, in favour of BA.
Its almost impossible to get a miles flight from LCY unless u choose BA.

My “loyalty” & interest were lost to Air Miles & its owner, some years ago, & will remain so, along with their relative earning n spending capability, which amounts to some 300% increase in 5 yrs!

[Isabel07]

I wonder when there will be a peak: the cost of flying becoming unbearable for the majority of revenue-earning passengers for the airlines…and simply turn away, adjusting their career and life styles? when would you stop flying? i am ignoring the conscious factor of carbon-emission right now…

[Thespiker]

On for the first time.Hi,
Will tickets booked back in November last year and with a deposit paid and a reciept returned by BA be subject to Fuel surcharges?
I mean if you ordered a new car and paid a deposit and it wasn’t ready for say three months and in that time the price of steel went up would you pay the extra costs when you picked up your new car…I,m damned sure you wouldn’t

[VintageKrug]

Fuel surcharges generally are applied at the timing of booking, assuming you pay for your ticket at that time.

As few airlines allow bookings to be held unpaid for long periods these days, most people pay the surcharge at the time they book.

So you should not expect to have to pay again with reputale airlines like BA and Virgin.

Having said that Ryanair, Easyjet and others may well choose in future to add an additional fee prior to departure.

This was the case when the twittish Gordon Brown fast tracked the imposition of yet another tax masquerading as environmental policy onto the long suffering, wealth creating travelling public during the bungled imposition of APD Air Passenger Duty.

Don’t forget to register at http://www.airpassengerrefund.co.uk if you flew exUK/exUS with BA or Virgin in the past few years, as you may be due a refund of some of these surcharges.

[Author]

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