Plane fare fees

In less than two weeks, I will fly again for an important meeting. I'm taking the budget airline Cebu Pacific. The plane fare, two-way, is only P6,800, but there are other fees. Here's how it looks:

1. Base Fare: PHP 6,798.00
2. Passeneger Service Charge: PHP 161.91
3. Passenger Security Service Charge: PHP 269.84
4. Aviation Levy: PHP 74.21

Items no. 2 to 4 are usually hidden and is unknown to the passenger if one will purchase the ticket at a travel agent or at the airline ticketing office. It's good that online payment gives these details. I dont know where these fees will go to -- the government or the airline company?

5. Other Taxes & Fees: PHP 0.00
6. Web Admin Fee: PHP 100.00
7. Travel Insurance: PHP 0.00
8. Excess Baggage:PHP 0.00

I thought that online payment is free, it's not. There is a P100 fee. Travel insurance fee is P250 each way I think, no need to purchase it as I didn't see this airline having a lousy record in passenger safety. Excess baggage is about P100 per kilogram.

9. Sports Equipment: PHP 0.00
10. WWF Donation: PHP 0.00
11. Seat Reservation: PHP 0.00
12. Go Lite Discount: PHP -100.00

No. 9 is P1,000. Now comes the climate rent-seeker and racketer WWF. If one is not careful, he/she may click the P222 each way "donation to fight climate change" for this shameless climate racketer.

Seat reservation fee is P100 each way. I can make my reservation when I check in, why pay P200 both ways? The "Go Lite" is P100 if one will check in a baggage. If none, then there's a P100 savings.

Total: PHP 7,303.96

Excluded here are additional taxes and fees by the State:

1. Travel tax, P1,620.
2. Airport terminal fee, P750.
Total P2,370, to be paid at the airport.

This travel tax, for me, is plain extortion by the government. There is zero service to the Filipino passenger, just a tax to sustain certain bureaucracies at the Department of Tourism (DOT) or the Office of the President (OP) or other offices.

The terminal fee of P750 is big, considering that the airport does not even have a drinking fountain, so passengers have to pay extra at the stalls there to buy bottled water. Other big airports in Asia -- HK, Singapore, KL, Seoul, Tokyo-Narita, etc. do not collect "terminal fee".

Anyway, these 2 topics, the travel tax and airport terminal fee, will be discussed further in another article here.