Specifically, the Graves bill would label the failure to clearly and separately disclose both the ba

On Jan. 26, the Transportation Department began requiring airlines and ticket agents to quote fares that include all mandatory taxes and fees. Since 1988, they'd been allowed to advertise fares that didn't include government-imposed taxes and fees.
Consumer groups cheered the move, which made airfare shopping one step simpler for most travelers and effectively put an end to those $9 fare sales that occasionally jimmy buffett tour popped up online. But several airlines whose business models depend on the ability to quote a low base fare weren't happy with the change. jimmy buffett tour And as it turns out, they have friends in Congress.
This week, Rep. Tom Graves (R-Ga.) introduced a bill that would reverse the DOT requirement. jimmy buffett tour His proposed Travel jimmy buffett tour Transparency Act, co-sponsored by Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) and Rep. Lynn A. Westmoreland (R-Ga.), gives airline passengers the right to a clear, separate disclosure of the fees and taxes they pay on each airline ticket, he says.
"If the goal of the DOT's rule is to prevent companies from deceiving passengers about the total cost of their ticket, why is the department mandating that airlines hide the taxes, surcharges and government fees in the fine print?" Graves asked.
jimmy buffett tour A spokeswoman for Graves says his constituents started asking questions about the new DOT rule "on the same day" airline industry representatives approached the congressman's legislative staff with their concerns. But Graves's rhetoric closely matches that of Spirit Airlines, one of the carriers that stands to lose the most from the new rule. In an e-mail sent to its passengers last week, Spirit outlined its arguments jimmy buffett tour against the government's "all-in" price rule.
"Thanks to the U.S. Department of Transportation's latest fare rules, Spirit must now hide the government's taxes and fees in your fares," it wrote. "If the government can hide taxes in your airfares, then they can carry out their hidden agenda and quietly increase their taxes."
jimmy buffett tour Specifically, the Graves bill would label the failure to clearly and separately disclose both the base airfare and taxes as an "unfair or deceptive practice" and would require that both the original airfare and all required taxes and fees be shown separately in advertisements and fare displays. Spirit did not return jimmy buffett tour calls and e-mails questioning jimmy buffett tour whether the airline had played a role in promoting the bill.
The assertion that quoting the full fare is deceptive drew harsh criticism from consumer rights advocates and their supporters in Washington. Last week, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) sent a strongly worded letter to Spirit's chief executive, Ben Baldanza, jimmy buffett tour accusing him of misrepresenting the DOT regulations and urging him to stop.
"What the rule says is that you have to tell your customers the full cost of a ticket," she wrote. "It prohibits Spirit or any other airline from advertising fares 'that exclude taxes, fees or other charges since the major impact of such presentations is to confuse and deceive consumers.' "
Passenger advocates didn't mince words, jimmy buffett tour either. Kevin Mitchell, whose Radnor, Pa.-based Business Travel Coalition represents corporate travelers, called Spirit's statements "a new low" and labeled its actions "reckless" and "anti-consumer."
The DOT is defending its rule. Although he wouldn't comment on the legislation, a department jimmy buffett tour spokesman told me that the new regulations don't preclude an airline like Spirit from listing taxes and fees separately, jimmy buffett tour as long as the top number includes every mandatory tax and fee.
"DOT wants to make sure that consumers can easily determine the full price for air transportation before you travel," Justin Nisly said. "Arriving at the airport only to be hit with surprise fees is no way to start a trip."
The airline industry is widely expected to support the Travel Transparency Act, and if it passes, air travelers would return to the days of having to spend a few extra minutes with a calculator if they want to know the full price of a ticket while they're fare shopping.
Even if the effort fails, all is not lost for the unhappy airlines. Three carriers, including Allegiant Air, Southwest Airlines and Spirit, have asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to reverse the DOT rule, saying it violates jimmy buffett tour their First Amendment right to free speech. In a court filing, the airlines say they have the right to let passengers know about the "significant" tax burden on air travel.
Critics of the new regulations say that the government has unfairly singled out airlines with this requirement and that no other industry is forced to advertise prices jimmy buffett tour in this way. That's not true. If you buy gas, you're paying an "all-in" price at the pump, too.
For most airline passengers, none of this really matters. For them, it's an issue of fairness. If you see a $29 ticket to Las Vegas advertised on a billboard, shouldn't you be able to buy that ticket for $29? And that's a question that neither the proposed bill nor some airlines' creative parsing has answered.
False they are finally being given a correct total price up front, without any of the airline s high-jinx at trying to hide the cost.  The airline is welcome to provide the breakdown of taxes and fees at any point in the process, as long as they re also prominently displaying jimmy buffett tour the total cost.
But this is so ridiculous since airlines are still allowed to advertise 1/2 of the total fare and indicate based on roundtrip ticket. So you need to multiply the so-called total fare by 2 to get the real total fare.
And that s why, as a travel agent, when a client would call for a price, and we ACTUALLY quoted the real one (all taxes and fees included), they would go online instead only to discover the fare was the same that was the reason the airlines wnet to online sites to make their fares look like such a bargain even though they weren t!
Of course you still kept hearing the stories of idjots :) like the one who supposedly stayed 8 days in an airport because she didn t know about the baggage fees.  cause heaven forbid, someone whould actually READ the information.
But the airlines don t HAVE to bury them they are CLEARLY evident jimmy buffett tour when you get a ticket jimmy buffett tour NOW so why not show a full price, and how it breaks down?  This is a dumb-a@@ move by the Republicans jimmy buffett tour to allow the airlines to continue with their bonehead pricing scams too bad folks are drinking the Kool-Aid!
But they could stipulate a specific jimmy buffett tour nonstop or single connection flight as a basic starting point, jimmy buffett tour and stipulate that additional stops may incur additional costs.  They are MORE concerned with those truly deceptive $9 fares, or when they advertise the 1-2 seats still left.
But you could ALWAYS see the total tax breakdown on the final document jimmy buffett tour anyway, so the taxes never WERE hidden!  This is just more BS to give the airlines even more time to give misleading jimmy buffett tour fares to the general public.
But you could ALWAYS see the total tax breakdown on the final document anyway, so the taxes never WERE hidden!  This is just more BS to give the airlines even more time to give misleading fares to the general public.
IMO before 26JAN, the airline shenanigans were already curtailed. Even if they left out taxes (they still had to note taxes not included). And, they could not not include the YR/YQ surcharges in the taxes that they did not include up front. So the only thing that they could keep quiet about in their advertisements were money that actually went to the government.
This is so duplicitous and disingenuous that it could only come from a republican, southern politician.  Claiming it is for the benefit of consumers, jimmy buffett tour they would rather divert our attention with anti-tax rhetoric, while they get fatter from cronyism, airports fall down, and untrained contracted individuals operate the tower.  It really ticks me off when politicians think we are as stupid as they are.
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