Airlines are advertising cheap air fares but then adding many hidden extras like taxes and fuel surcharges to the cost of the ticket. Graham Turner, founder of Flight Centre, has attacked airlines and said that they are cheating their customers by advertising cheap flights and then adding on hundreds of dollars in extra charges.

Flight Centre is a travel and holiday specialist for Australia and they made a statement saying “Fuel, like maintenance, taxes and labour costs, is obviously an integral component of air travel expense, so it is difficult to see why it should be treated as a separate surcharge.” Flight centre have quoted that a flight from Australia to Britain has a huge fuel surcharge and can add $200 to $800 to the ticket price.

Mr Turner has requested that all airlines include these extra charges in their ticket prices. Emirates airline has adopted this policy and includes all surcharges in their ticked prices. Mr Turner noted that Emirates airline have benefited greatly from this policy as their all inclusive fares as resulted in an increase in business. Emirates include all extra costs in their ticked prices, to see more of Emirates offers see http://www.emirates.com/

Chris Bowen, Federal Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, is tackling the problem of hidden extras by introducing legislation that tackles airline fuel surcharges. They would like to see all airlines disclose surcharges in their advertising and ban component pricing in the future.

To read more about Flight Centre visit their website at http://www.flightcentre.com.au/