Airport tax refund rip off?

GlennTheBaker

Sam_Bee wrote: »

Why would they only refund me £10 per person then when the tax was a lot higher? Or are they playing with words?? :rolleyes2

Anyway, it's an oft repeated topic (maybe should all be merged to reduce mutual head banging?).

Air Passenger Duty on short-haul flights is £10.

fifeken

stoneman wrote: »

There you go, another reason not to fly with the LCC's. Come on people, stump up reasonable money and fly with a "proper" airline, after of course reading the T&C's to make sure they are not pulling the same trick, then you don't have to worry about things like changing your name on a booking because you missed one letter out, reclaiming airport duty, going 1 KG over the weight limit, paying double what the leading price says because of the obligatory add on's, being charged 4 times for 1 card transaction, not giving you food and drink vouchers or trying to wriggle out of compensation under the EU treaty, landing at Barcelona only to find out you are a 1 hour coach drive and 23 euros extra away. I know this is a money saving website, but sometimes money saving doesn't turn out to be money saving

What a crock!!!
A mis-spelling is not a name change and they don't charge the earth - most of the time they'll do it for free. Traditional carriers charge admin fee for tax reclaiming. Nearly all add-ons are optional and I normally know where I'm going to land before I confirm the booking. I pack in accordance with T & Cs or I'm prepared to pay more if I want more. Card transactions are easily avoidable - the Electron card must be the easiest one to get as it's aimed at people with no or poor credit rating. I travel full service long haul regularly and know what to expect. I have also travelled with several LCCs over the last few years and they have a (different) product available that suits me and many, many others perfectly.

Tozer

dmg24 wrote: »

I don't doubt that you believed what you have said, but possibly the reason that you have this misinformation is because you digest everything that you hear?

A great deal of information on the internet, and indeed on the MSE forums, is wholly incorrect. Most people make statements with good intentions, but really are just passing on hearsay.

If you are looking for someone that knows their stuff in this area, then Tozer is the person that you should be listening to.

DMG24 also knows her stuff! :beer:

Tozer

Thailand wrote: »

Fair do's. There does appear to be something in this breach of contract stuff, and maybe loss of profits, which would be different to the banks, apparantly.

Can I assure you, I wasn't intending to give false information.. it was what I whole-heartedly believed, and I'm still not sure I'm wrong. I will of course digest everything I hearing, because I wouldn't want to give out bad advice.

Can I show you my thread on CAG, because right or wrong, this is what I was led to believe.

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/holiday-companies/52879-ryanair-getting-your-taxes.html
All that said, wether challengable or not, I would still believe they withold taxes with the sole intention of profiteering out of them!

No worries. Believe me on this though, the underlying theory in respect of the law of penalties is that it cannot punish the person who is in breach of contract. Its all down to the principles of contractual damages.

There is no breach of contract here so the penalties argument does not apply.

Yes it would be small claims court. And the airline may attribute a "nuisance" value to the claim and settle it. But I can 100% say that a penalties argument would fail.

Tozer

fifeken wrote: »

What a crock!!!
A mis-spelling is not a name change and they don't charge the earth - most of the time they'll do it for free. Traditional carriers charge admin fee for tax reclaiming. Nearly all add-ons are optional and I normally know where I'm going to land before I confirm the booking. I pack in accordance with T & Cs or I'm prepared to pay more if I want more. Card transactions are easily avoidable - the Electron card must be the easiest one to get as it's aimed at people with no or poor credit rating. I travel full service long haul regularly and know what to expect. I have also travelled with several LCCs over the last few years and they have a (different) product available that suits me and many, many others perfectly.

I agree. That said, I cannot stand Ryanair! Just find them a bit tacky and I would choose not to fly them unless they were cheaper / more convenient.

Easyjet have always been very impressive in my view.

Thailand

Tozer wrote: »

No worries. Believe me on this though, the underlying theory in respect of the law of penalties is that it cannot punish the person who is in breach of contract. Its all down to the principles of contractual damages.

There is no breach of contract here so the penalties argument does not apply.

Yes it would be small claims court. And the airline may attribute a "nuisance" value to the claim and settle it. But I can 100% say that a penalties argument would fail.

Thanks for the reply, Tozer.

If this issue didn't highlight so many grey areas, I would have left this alone, but I'm of a curious breed, and I simply must get to the bottom of it!

The nuisance value for me is tantermount to a banks gesture of good will, if they are in the right, why don't they deal with it? I know why banks don't, and whilst that is debatable for some, for me it's because they know they are in the wrong. (lmao, they would defend in a New York minute to save the cash, and outright stop the hundreds of thousands of claims stacking up) Let's at least accept that fact. I am realising there is potentially some difference between the Bank argument and this one, but it is all of a similar vein - regardless of the legalities.

On that, would you agree that they do indeed wrongly profit from kept, and uncharged, APD?

Tozer

Thailand wrote: »

Thanks for the reply, Tozer.

If this issue didn't highlight so many grey areas, I would have left this alone, but I'm of a curious breed, and I simply must get to the bottom of it!

The nuisance value for me is tantermount to a banks gesture of good will, if they are in the right, why don't they deal with it? I know why banks don't, and whilst that is debatable for some, for me it's because they know they are in the wrong. (lmao, they would defend in a New York minute to save the cash, and outright stop the hundreds of thousands of claims stacking up) Let's at least accept that fact. I am realising there is potentially some difference between the Bank argument and this one, but it is all of a similar vein - regardless of the legalities.

On that, would you agree that they do indeed wrongly profit from kept, and uncharged, APD?

I don't see a grey area at all. To my mind, the issues are completely separate.

I don't think they profit from keeping taxes. If you paid the £20 you would get £10 back. So the charge is actually the delta - £10.

If you have ever dealt with any sort of government department - particularly enmasse - you would know how labour intensive it can be to claim these sort of things back.

Imagine if they didn't charge for the reclaim. The cost would have to go somewhere. On the ticket price so, eventually, no more low cost airlines.

Thailand

Tozer wrote: »

I don't see a grey area at all. To my mind, the issues are completely separate.

Maybe. Not a penalty or a service, I'm starting to look at it as theft.

I don't think they profit from keeping taxes. If you paid the £20 you would get £10 back. So the charge is actually the delta - £10.

I'm not sure where the £20 is coming from, but what possible reason do they give for keeping the £10 charge? admin?. I'd love to know how they can get away with charging that for adminless admin, and how to go about challenging it. I've read threads before that claim victory against the airlines, but none to the contrary. Of course people don't go out of thier way to admit defeat. I wonder why Ryaair didn't forward me the simple proof that broke down thier costs, and twisted it around (quite miraculously) to imply I'd asked for a breakdown of my taxes.... a mistake I'm sure :rolleyes:

If you have ever dealt with any sort of government department - particularly enmasse - you would know how labour intensive it can be to claim these sort of things back.

I haven't, certainly not en masse

Imagine if they didn't charge for the reclaim. The cost would have to go somewhere. On the ticket price so, eventually, no more low cost airlines.

lost me, do you mean charge us for reclaiming?

LCC's have no right, in my opinion, to retain unpaid APD (at least return all monies not incurred, if proved there are costs, and that wouldn't be hard). It is no justification they might go out of business should they not be allowed to just keep it.

When I said theft earlier, I don't mean a crime as such, just that they are helping themselves to it.

If you do mean charge us for reclaiming above, I would have no problem in them deducting a realistic figure for say 5 minutes of staff time, stationary and postage. It may seem petty on an APD of £10, but it is not right they just pocket the rest. Then there are multiple APD's paid on a single booking, not to mention long haul.

Tozer

Thailand wrote: »

LCC's have no right, in my opinion, to retain unpaid APD (at least return all monies not incurred, if proved there are costs, and that wouldn't be hard). It is no justification they might go out of business should they not be allowed to just keep it.

When I said theft earlier, I don't mean a crime as such, just that they are helping themselves to it.

If you do mean charge us for reclaiming above, I would have no problem in them deducting a realistic figure for say 5 minutes of staff time, stationary and postage. It may seem petty on an APD of £10, but it is not right they just pocket the rest. Then there are multiple APD's paid on a single booking, not to mention long haul.

They don't retain it. They just make an administration charge to refund it to you.

What is realistic? To be honest, an effective charge of £10 doesn't seem at all unreasonable to me.

Thailand

Tozer wrote: »

They don't retain it. They just make an administration charge to refund it to you.

Which for some reason is magically the same, or more than the refund amount. This is why they need to be taken to task, and be forced to provide a breakdown of thier admin fees. I don't see why it's any different than the thousands being reclaimed from the catalogues companies and profit makers of a similar ilk, who use admin as an excuse to extract profit. Funny that they, like the banks, never make it to the courts lol (seldom in the extreme). Maybe we'll never be able to approach these matters factually, as they can see when they've been sussed and cough up.

Come on Ryanair - show us your breakdowns, you are in the right after all.

What is realistic?

Errr a fee that is representitive to thier costs? that might be fair!!! They would just have to generate the income in a way that was honest, shock, horror.

LCC's must love that most passengers don't know APD should be reclaimable and pocket the cash. Those that try get fobbed of with a fib, IMO.

Imagine a world where uncharged APD was auto-refunded to our cards, meaning no admin?