When Payless double-charges Marena Henne for fuel, she calls on a consumer advocate for help. Is her bill fixable? Read more “Payless asked me to pay twice for fuel”
Tag: FUEL
The irrational logic of airline fuel surcharges
How do you turn sour grapes into a rare and expensive vintage? Ask your favorite airline; for over a decade they’ve been fermenting profits ever since the fuel surcharges were no longer needed to cover oil price spikes.
Look out! Here comes electronic fuel metering
“An agent noted that the tank was full,” says Freeman, an architect from Atlanta. The gauge also registered that the tank was at capacity, she says.
But a few days later, when she reviewed her credit card bill, she discovered that Avis had charged her an extra $7.43 for 0.8 gallons of gas, or about $9.29 per gallon. She called the company to complain.
“A representative told me that according to a satellite, when I picked up my car, it had 16.9 gallons in it,” she says. “And when I returned it, it had 16.1 gallons. I checked the ticket from pickup and there’s no mention of the fuel quantity other than ‘G8’ — which means full.”
Read more “Look out! Here comes electronic fuel metering”
A $93 “top off” charge for my rental car?
Question: I rented a car from Hertz in Miami a few months ago. Before returning it, I filled it up with gas. When I turned the car in, I double-checked the fuel gauge, made sure my receipt reflected that the car had been returned full, and, thinking I had myself covered, flew home.
Read more “A $93 “top off” charge for my rental car?”
Ridiculous or not? Airlines fall in love with fuel surcharges all over again
When Sylvia Dawson tried to book airline tickets from New York to London for a group traveling next month, she was taken aback by the fare.
“We were told by Virgin Atlantic that there would be a fuel surcharge of $98 per person,” she says.
Dawson isn’t a novice who would be shocked by news like that. She’s a travel agent who specializes in tours to England, and books a lot of flights over the pond. The reservation was for a group of 20 clients headed to the U.K. on a tour.
“We know that the price of oil has skyrocketed,” she says. “But this group has been booked with Virgin since the beginning of the year. It seems that the increase is somewhat over the top.”
Worse, her group couldn’t pull out of the trip without incurring heavy penalties. The airline had them over a barrel, figuratively speaking. Either they would pay 14 percent more for the price of their tickets or lose their vacations.
Fuel surcharges are a peculiar thing. On domestic flights, the price of fuel must be included in the base fare quoted to passengers. But international flights aren’t regulated the same way, and an airline can quote a low base fare but then add a “fuel surcharge” later.
Is Virgin Atlantic out of line?
Read more “Ridiculous or not? Airlines fall in love with fuel surcharges all over again”