According to ElEconomista newspaper, only Ryanair and Vueling have passed on the cost of increased landing fees at Spanish airports to their customers.
So yes, if you’d flown with a better airline you’d be happier and have paid less for the ticket. Makes you think, eh?
Landing fees went up by an average of 19% across Spain on July 1st, although Madrid and Barcelona both went up by some 50%.
None of the other airlines operating in Spain will charge customers who bought their tickets before the increase was announced the difference.
Ryanair, who serviced 13,2 million passengers in Spain last year, has been accused of charging customers credit cards the difference without due notice, and customers have been complaining that they have not been given any option but to pay or not fly.
Finally, here’s a gratuitous Ryanair picture I found on the web:
50% increase at Madrid and Barcelona is goign to hit those cities hard when they can least withstand it. Neither has a major second airport for the low-cost airlines to migrate to. The big low-costs like EasyJet will tough it out, and Ryanair doesn’t fly into Barcelona anyway (Girona is not Barcelona, Mr. O’Leary – you con merchant!) but the smaller ones are probabaly going to call it a day and pack their bags. It’s going to affect a lot city break tourism, but also a lot of business travel, particularly those doing business with eastern Europe, as traditional airlines don’t serve those destinations well from either city – and many Spanish businesses aren’t large enough to have dedicated accounts with the traditional carriers anyway.
Bad move, AENA. Better to have cut fees and attracted more business – both MAD and BCN have plenty of spare capacity! Take advantage the BA / Iberia merger and the gridlock at Heathrow by feeding traffic into Madrid and Barcelona from UK regional airports, then onto long-haul from there, just like KLM did (very successfully) with Amsterdam using KLM-UK / CityHopper. UK regional airports are also feeling the pinch and would be ready to give Iberia/BA incentives at their end too, if it meant good connections.