Some Airlines Drop Fuel Surcharges (Yours Isn't One of Them)

Above, oil prices have dropped and airlines have switched to fuel-efficient jets like the
Boeing 787, yet they still tack a "fuel surcharge" onto tickets. Why? Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Oil prices have plummeted in recent weeks, yet the airlines (for the most part) refuse to give up their "oil surcharge" fees.

Rick Seaney, CEO of FareCompare has an article at the ABC News website on why this is so.

He begins with:

When I began writing for ABC back in 2008, one of my first columns was about the "madness" of fuel surcharges, which were high but so was oil, hovering around $130 a barrel. 

Today, oil has plummeted to less than $48, but the insanity continues. An example is the price of a ticket on a major U.S. airline's New York-London route, $1,092. It includes lots of taxes and fees imposed by both governments, but the really interesting part is the rest of the ticket. 

Base fare: $403 

Fuel surcharge: $458 

Crazy, huh? A surcharge costing more than the ride. Worse, $458 is the same surcharge levied back in August when oil was nearly twice the price. So why are so many airlines still charging so much money? Because they can.

It is still best to shop around for the best airfare prices. I have settled on GatewayLAX for airline tickets to Japan (and I have used them for domestic flights, too) as I have obtained the best prices through them over the years. I've used Priceline.com and Travelocity in years past, but GatewayLAX consistently has them beat.

To read more, go here.