Ever been caught out by those ‘hidden’ fees that some airlines seem to spring on us? You might find a cheap flight, but make a mistake with your name or forget to print out your boarding pass, and you can find yourself having to foot a big bill. The Internet is full of people grumbling about airline hidden fees but now it seems that the government are taking notice and plans are in place for a big crackdown on these unfair fees.
It’s all about clarity
Air travel always comes at a price, but it’s incredibly annoying when that price suddenly goes up when you’re at the end of the booking process. Suddenly you’re paying extra just to book a seat so your family are all seated together. Your suitcase costs extra, that extra legroom seat you selected comes at an extra cost and to top it all off there’s a booking fee added on right at the end.
While airlines deny that their costs are hidden, the government is putting plans into place to ensure that all costs are presented in an obvious manner, and they have also announced that any charges deemed to be excessive will have to be reviewed by the airline concerned.
Massive differences in fees between airlines
Any idea how much it costs to change a name on a flight booking? Unless you’ve had to do it, you will probably have no idea, and you’ll only be dealing with the airline you’ve got your booking with, so you’re not likely to ever know whether you’re paying way more than passengers changing bookings for other airlines.
So you might be surprised to hear that there are some huge differences for the same service between different airlines. Let’s take for example, Ryanair and EasyJet. Two low cost airlines that are popular with holiday makers. Fly with EasyJet, and if you want to change a name it will cost you £47 to change a name online, or £52 if you make the change via their call centre. If there is a spelling mistake in a name, then this will be corrected free of charge. Now let’s take a look at the same service from Ryanair. If you change a name with this airline, it will cost you a massive £115 to make the change online, and if you do this at the airport, the fee is a whopping £160. For a short haul flight, this could cost you even more than the actual cost of your ticket!
A step in the right direction
Hopefully these new government measures will ensure that we are all kept aware of the extra charges and we won’t have any nasty surprises when we’re booking our airline tickets in the future!
Emily is an avid writer with a passion for the travel industry. She also loves learning and writing about nutrition and healthy living. Emily is based in the UK.
