Unheralded Heathrow Airport raised its passenger taxes by £8.90 on Saturday 6 February.

In  a statement the airport put its case without specifically mentioning the pandemic, the underlying cause of its loss of revenue.

“Heathrow provides key airport services like the baggage system, colleague car parks, airline check-in desks and utilities for our partners to use. The fee to use these services is calculated purely to cover the cost of providing them – Heathrow makes absolutely zero profit from these services. To ensure this remains the case, the fee is closely monitored by the CAA, as well as being scrutinised and agreed with airport users annually – as was the case with this year's charge. The cost per passenger to cover these services naturally fluctuates depending on the number of passengers using the airport.”

The charge has been passed on to airline customers.  This is a typical British Airways add-on to the airline's ticket price for a return trip to Paris.  The actual fare shown on the BA website includes this charge.

www.heathrow.com

www.ba.com

Air Passenger Duty – United Kingdom	£13.00
R1CA	£  8.90
Passenger Service Charge – United Kingdom	£17.77
Civil Aviation Tax	£  4.10
Airport Tax	£10.30
Solidarity Tax For France And French Overseas	£  1.00
Infrastructure Development Tax – France	£  1.30
Passenger Service Charge (International) – France	£11.50
Total	£67.87
Total Fees for a return flight
(Economy both ways)
Edinburgh	£  62.98
New York	£326.62