Yes, gas prices have dropped significantly in 2015, which is great if you have a car. But it doesn’t really help you out when you’re flying, as airlines don’t really seem to want to pass the savings on to travelers. Airline execs have offered plenty of explanations as to why “fuel surcharge” on the fare breakdown of your plane ticket remains so high. In reality, fuel surcharges have almost nothing to do with fuel. But if an airline is going to charge you the same amount anyway, why does it matter how the price is broken down between base fare and fuel surcharge? Well, the truth is, it doesn’t — unless you’re buying an award ticket.
Geoff Ardern recently complained to the CBC that he wound up having to pay around $697 CAD ($500) for what should have been a “free” award ticket with Aeroplan — Air Canada’s rewards program — all because of fuel surcharges. And that’s on top of the 75,000 points he had to use for the flight from Halifax to Manchester, U.K. He did fly business class, which still kinda, sorta, maybe makes this a decent deal, depending on how you look at it (a Google Flights search turned up results starting at $2,000).
An Air Canada spokesperson told CBC:
These charges are collected by airlines to partially offset certain volatile, unpredictable or fluctuating operating costs and fees, and certain fare premiums linked to peak travel periods … Among other things, these carrier surcharges can be used to offset some of the following costs: fuel, navigational charges, or select peak travel dates to and from certain destinations.
So, hmm. Not really much to do with fuel.
If airlines lowered fuel surcharges and redistributed them to where they actually belong — the base fare — paying customers would still pay the same, but travelers redeeming award tickets would save a bundle of money, and get rewarded by actually traveling for free. Of course, that probably won’t be happening any time soon, so here are a few ways to get around fuel surcharges:
- Fly carriers like Southwest, United, TAM, LAN and JetBlue, which don’t charge fuel surcharges on awards.
- Even airlines like Air Canada — as well as carriers including Alaska, British Airways, Delta and Virgin America/Atlantic — don’t charge fuel surcharges on all flights. For example, Air Canada doesn’t charge fuel surcharges on airlines like United, Swiss and Singapore. And British Airways charges such outrageous fuel surcharges for transatlantic flights it renders your miles almost worthless. However, BA great for short-haul redemptions within the U.S. for flights on American or flights to Latin America via LAN.
- Diversify your points by using a credit card that will allow you to transfer points to a variety of airlines — like Chase Sapphire or SPG — so you can have various options. That way you can have options. For example, you can transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards to British Airways for flights on partners Air Berlin, Aer Lingus, Alaska, and LAN — for which it doesn’t include fuel surcharges — or United for all other flights.
The Canadian passenger got a rough deal, but it’s a lesson we can learn from when it comes to redeeming points.