Tax Increased For Both Domestic And International Flights

[Jai Dee]

Tax increased in both of domestic and international flights

Airport of Thailand (AOT) has announced to raise the airport tax of both domestic and international flights. The announcement is effective today.

Mr. Chotisak Asupwiriya (โชติศักดิ์ อาสภวิริยะ), the President of the Airport of Thailand company, informed that the tax for domestic flights will be raised from 50 baht to 100 baht per each flight, while the tax of the international flight will increase from 500 baht to 700 baht per flight.

He said that the increase in fares will create more revenues to the airport by 20 percent or approximately 1,300 million baht per year.

In addition, Mr. Chotisak said that the airport will increase landing tax fee by 15 percent, starting from April 1st.

He said that the measures will give generate an additional 450 million baht of the revenue to the airport, adding that the partial revenue will be spent to renovate some areas of Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Source: Thai National News Bureau Public Relations Department - 01 February 2007

[dogleg]

100 per cent on domestic and 40 per cent on international = 20 per cent rise?

[sibeymai]

".........the partial revenue will be spent to renovate some areas of Suvarnabhumi Airport.:

And what areas might they be I wonder ?

[buriramboy]

they will struggle to increase revenues if less people are going to come here, but on the positive side apparantly the new tax is included in the ticket price so no need to pay the 700 baht at the airport (or so i've been told)

[hiromj]

Tax increased in both of domestic and international flights

He said that the increase in fares will create more revenues to the airport by 20 percent or approximately 1,300 million baht per year.

He said that the measures will give generate an additional 450 million baht of the revenue to the airport, adding that the partial revenue will be spent to renovate some areas of Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Source: Thai National News Bureau Public Relations Department - 01 February 2007

And what will they do with the rest of the revenue?

[marquess]

Tax increased in both of domestic and international flights

Airport of Thailand (AOT) has announced to raise the airport tax of both domestic and international flights. The announcement is effective today.

Mr. Chotisak Asupwiriya (โชติศักดิ์ อาสภวิริยะ), the President of the Airport of Thailand company, informed that the tax for domestic flights will be raised from 50 baht to 100 baht per each flight, while the tax of the international flight will increase from 500 baht to 700 baht per flight.

He said that the increase in fares will create more revenues to the airport by 20 percent or approximately 1,300 million baht per year.

In addition, Mr. Chotisak said that the airport will increase landing tax fee by 15 percent, starting from April 1st.

He said that the measures will give generate an additional 450 million baht of the revenue to the airport, adding that the partial revenue will be spent to renovate some areas of Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Source: Thai National News Bureau Public Relations Department - 01 February 2007

So in other words screw the customer to pay for their mistakes!?

[sibeymai]

Build critical airport infrastructure which is missing from the new site.........

What time do we tee off ?

[devildog683]

That is ridiculous, travel taxes are getting out of hand all over. We flew back to the US from Okinawa for the holidays and it was $700 for each ticket BUT $350 tax each.

[esprit]

Could be worse they could have copied the UK where it doubled as from today. even with all the problems assciated with Suvarnabhumi Airport LHR T4 is still bit of a cattle market with up to 1 hour queues at immigration. That's aon a good day when all the X-Ray machines are manned/working properly.

These are the new "value for money" air travel taxes for flights booked out of the UK airports.

Economy class flights in Europe, including internal UK flights: £10

Business and first class flights in Europe: £20

Economy class long-haul flights: £40

Business and first class long-haul flights: £80

[terryp]

Landing Fee's Going Up At The Hub????

April Fool's Day...............

[John K]

Not to many places in the world will you find the words ‘new’ and ‘repair’ talking about the same thing.

[Old Man River]

At least foreigners and Thais are being charged the same amount. No "special" farang pricing at the airport(s).

[sanook1]

100 per cent on domestic and 40 per cent on international = 20 per cent rise?

no smart ass they have other incomes also like landing fees

durrrr:P

lol

[toptuan]

At least foreigners and Thais are being charged the same amount. No "special" farang pricing at the airport(s).

Shhhhhhhhhh!

[BritTim]

Aljazeera has a pretty interesting report on the airport woes, including a story about Sermsuk Kasitipradit, the Bangkok Post reporter who broke the news about the cracks two years ago and was sacked under pressure from Mr Thaksin for his temerity.

See http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/06B...3F9742DD368.htm

Of course, facing up to the problem over 18 months before the airport opened might have made it easier to deal with, but that would not be very Thai!

[wintermute]

Aljazeera has a pretty interesting report on the airport woes, including a story about Sermsuk Kasitipradit, the Bangkok Post reporter who broke the news about the cracks two years ago and was sacked under pressure from Mr Thaksin for his temerity.

See http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/06B...3F9742DD368.htm

Of course, facing up to the problem over 18 months before the airport opened might have made it easier to deal with, but that would not be very Thai!

Of course. Save face at all costs even if it means billion dollar disasters!

[britmaveric]

Pay for redoing the runways most likely!!

[samran]

These increases in taxes were on the cards as far back as 2003. The timing is unfortunate, but these decisions were made in 2004, if not before.

The tax was supposed to pay for the new airport, and not, as some people seem to think, for the costs of the repair.

[thaigene2]

In addition, Mr. Chotisak said that the airport will increase landing tax fee by 15 percent, starting from April 1st.

He said that the measures will give generate an additional 450 million baht of the revenue to the airport, adding that the partial revenue will be spent to renovate some areas of Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Jai Dee you rock..

Assume they'll be 'renovating' the runways? Will the same families with long names get to do another dirty? Of course - ye of little faith. TIT.

BTW - was thru there a couple of times in the last week. One wing of gates completely shut down. Everyone funneled thru another wing and harried security taking 30 minutes to scan thousands of people - queues literally hundreds long at the security check. Felt sorry for the Thai security people.

Unrelatedly, but foreboding was the Thai (TG) check-in for Asian flights - took an hour to queue. (H and J??)

Go early is my best recommendation - TG2

[sriracha john]

Tax increased in both of domestic and international flights

Airport of Thailand (AOT) has announced to raise the airport tax of both domestic and international flights. The announcement is effective today.

Mr. Chotisak Asupwiriya, the President of the Airport of Thailand company, informed that the tax for domestic flights will be raised from 50 baht to 100 baht per each flight, while the tax of the international flight will increase from 500 baht to 700 baht per flight.

Interesting that the day he makes the announcement, he also resigns from his position:

Axe falls on AoT, Suvarnabhumi Airport bosses

Additionally, the airlines don't seem to agree with all of this:

AIRPORTS PASSENGER SERVICE CHARGE

Fee hike unjustified, say airlines

A hefty increase in passenger service charges at airports run by the Airports of Thailand (AoT) went into effect quietly yesterday, as airlines questioned the justification for the move. The charge for international departure flights increased by 40% from 500 baht to 700 baht, and doubled for domestic flights, from 50 baht to 100 baht. Airlines said the steep rises are unjustified when passengers are still putting up with poor service and facilities at the troubled Suvarnabhumi airport. Most of the problems which have annoyed many passengers passing through Bangkok's new airport since its opening on Sept 28, ranging from long waits for luggage to insufficient toilet facilities, poor air-conditioning and general uncleanliness, have not been tackled, they said.

Continued here:

http://www.bangkokpost.com/News/02Feb2007_news12.php

Interesting to note the profits of the AoT... In the last fiscal year, BEFORE the hike, AoT posted a 41% jump in net profit to 10.4 BILLION baht.

Edited February 2, 2007 by sriracha john

[john b good]

Tax increased in both of domestic and international flights

He said that the increase in fares will create more revenues to the airport by 20 percent or approximately 1,300 million baht per year.

He said that the measures will give generate an additional 450 million baht of the revenue to the airport, adding that the partial revenue will be spent to renovate some areas of Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Source: Thai National News Bureau Public Relations Department - 01 February 2007

And what will they do with the rest of the revenue?

What "rest of the revenue"?

The cost of resolving Suvarnabhumi's problems is gonna be lots more than 1.3 billion baht.

[wpcoe]

These increases in taxes were on the cards as far back as 2003. The timing is unfortunate, but these decisions were made in 2004, if not before.

The tax was supposed to pay for the new airport, and not, as some people seem to think, for the costs of the repair.

IIRC, werent the tax increases originally supposed to be applied upon opening of the new airport, but were delayed for some reason until now? What was the reason for the delay in the increase, and how did they choose Feb 1st?

[samran]

These increases in taxes were on the cards as far back as 2003. The timing is unfortunate, but these decisions were made in 2004, if not before.

The tax was supposed to pay for the new airport, and not, as some people seem to think, for the costs of the repair.

IIRC, werent the tax increases originally supposed to be applied upon opening of the new airport, but were delayed for some reason until now? What was the reason for the delay in the increase, and how did they choose Feb 1st?

No idea, but the fact that it co-incides more or less with the automatic payment of airport tax with the ticket may have had something to do with it.

The airport tax as I recall is split 50/50 between AOT (definetly) and Ministry of Transport (I think). There was a shitfight for years between to two on how it was collected but now that squabble seems to be over now.

[sriracha john]

Tax

tax

taxes

taxes

tax

tax

tax

tax

It's NOT A TAX, people...

It's the Airport Passenger Service Charge

thank you....

[kmart]

So in other words screw the customer to pay for their mistakes!?

Thats about it. Doing business here is seldom cheap due to corruption, inept workmanship, and the lackadaisical, bovine attitude towards it.