Aer Lingus fuel surcharge to rise

Aer Lingus plans to increase its fuel surcharge on long-haul flights by about €5 per journey as a response to rising global oil prices. Oil prices touched $83 a barrel this week, close to an all-time high.

The surcharge will not apply to short-haul flights.

Aer Lingus currently charges €40 per sector for flights to New York, Boston, Chicago, Orlando and Washington, and €50 on its flights to San Francisco and Los Angeles.

The fuel surcharge increase will also apply to its services from Dublin to Dubai, although the airline looks set to drop this route from its summer schedule, which will be announced in the next couple of weeks.

It is understood that bookings on the Dubai route did not match expectations in the summer months. In addition, the number of passengers using it as a transit stop for onward travel to other destinations in Asia or Australia did not meet projections.

Aer Lingus is expected to use the aircraft which services the three-times-a-week schedule to Dubai to increase frequency on its flights to the US.

Following the agreement of an open skies deal this year between the EU and the US, Aer Lingus announced three new routes to Washington, Orlando and San Francisco.

The service to Dubai was launched in March 2006 and was projected to carry 70,000 passengers a year.

Aer Lingus has never published passenger numbers for the Middle East route, but load factors per flight are believed to have ranged from the mid-70 per cents in the summer months to the low-80 per cents in the winter.

The surcharge on flights to Dubai is currently €40 per sector.

Aer Lingus, which is currently locked in dispute with its pilots, is expected to announce the fuel surcharge increase in the next week or two.

At the end of September, Lufthansa, Swiss, Air France and KLM all increased their fuel surcharges on long-haul flights by €5 per sector. Air France, KLM and Lufthansa also increased the surcharge on short-haul flights within Europe. Their moves prompted Ryanair to lodged a complaint of price-fixing with the European Commission.

Aer Lingus last increased its fuel surcharge on May 9th, adding €10 per sector to the levy. This reversed a decrease which was implemented in February.