{"id":9307,"date":"2009-11-03T20:00:15","date_gmt":"2009-11-04T00:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/?p=9307"},"modified":"2009-11-03T20:00:15","modified_gmt":"2009-11-04T00:00:15","slug":"airlines-and-credit-card-fees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/","title":{"rendered":"Airlines And Credit Card Fees"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chris Elliot has a provocative article<\/a> about airlines and credit card fees.\u00a0\u00a0 He suggests that this is the next frontier in the fee war that airlines have been waging on customers for several years now.\u00a0\u00a0 He cites two discount carriers, Allegiant and Spirit as having de facto credit card fees.<\/p>\n

My Take<\/strong><\/p>\n

While I share his outrage at the airlines for their reckless treatment of their customers, I am not sure that Allegiant and Spirit are actually applying credit card fees.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This fee applies to everyone who does not purchase a ticket at the airport.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 To me, it is just a hidden fee so that they can advertise low fares, and string prospective ers as far along the road to a ticket purchase as possible, before disclosing the real price.\u00a0\u00a0 Sadly, this practice is becoming more and more common with companies from cell phone carriers charging “regulatory recovery” fees to auto mechanics adding “shop fees”.\u00a0 \u00a0 Don’t even get me started on event ticket “convenience fees” \u00a0 \u00a0 These fees are all wrong and bad, but it is still not the same thing as a credit card fee, so long as they are not pushing you towards another method of payment.\u00a0 Doing so would violate their merchant agreements with Mastercard, Visa, and the like.<\/p>\n

When Is It Good To Pay Credit Card Fees?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Some European discount airlines are starting to accept PayPal, electronic checks, or other financing options in lieu of credit cards.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In this case, they are actually charging an additional fee for credit cards.<\/p>\n

When would I pay these fees?\u00a0 My gut response is never, however there may come a time where they are a necessary evil.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 When it comes to travel, airlines in particular, it has long been held as a rule that you should always pay for your ticket with a credit card.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This is so that when airlines go out of business, you are protected.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Every time it happens, the news reports inform customers that if they paid with a credit card, they merely have to contact their bank and they will get their money back.\u00a0\u00a0 People who paid any other way are essentially hung out to dry.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If and when airlines start adding fees for credit card use, I will probably pay them, albeit reluctantly and with disgust.<\/p>\n

What Fees You Should Worry About<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am not as worried about pure credit card fees from the airlines as I am with undisclosed foreign transaction fees.\u00a0\u00a0 Elliot hits the nail on the head when he berates companies for sneaking these in, seemingly at random, whenever some part of a transaction can be tied to some foreign company.\u00a0\u00a0 In all cases, these fees are reversed when you take the time to complain to your bank.\u00a0\u00a0 That is further evidence that these fees are bogus,\u00a0 and that it is up to you to notice them and complain.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 At this rate, any time you anything not made in the United States, you will risk getting hit with these bogus fees.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Elliot points out that the banks have already been hit with a major class action suit on this matter, and they seemed to have learned nothing.<\/p>\n

Until then, be sure to use a card that does not charge foreign transaction fees whenever you are actually making purchases in other currencies.\u00a0\u00a0 Such cards include the Schwab Bank card or any card from\u00a0 Capitol One.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It doesn’t hurt that these cards offer really good cash back rewards as well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chris Elliot has a provocative article about airlines and credit card fees.\u00a0\u00a0 He suggests that this is the next frontier in the fee war that airlines have been waging on customers for several years now.\u00a0\u00a0 He cites two discount carriers, Allegiant and Spirit as having de facto credit card fees. My Take While I share […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nAirlines And Credit Card Fees<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Airlines And Credit Card Fees\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Chris Elliot has a provocative article about airlines and credit card fees.\u00a0\u00a0 He suggests that this is the next frontier in the fee war that airlines have been waging on customers for several years now.\u00a0\u00a0 He cites two discount carriers, Allegiant and Spirit as having de facto credit card fees. My Take While I share […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Ask Mr Credit Card Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-11-04T00:00:15+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jason Steele\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jason Steele\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/\",\"name\":\"Airlines And Credit Card Fees\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2009-11-04T00:00:15+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2009-11-04T00:00:15+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/18331587d05ff4eaeee29fd913227597\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Airlines And Credit Card Fees\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/\",\"name\":\"Ask Mr Credit Card Blog\",\"description\":\"Just another WordPress site\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/18331587d05ff4eaeee29fd913227597\",\"name\":\"Jason Steele\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/author\/jsteele\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Airlines And Credit Card Fees","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Airlines And Credit Card Fees","og_description":"Chris Elliot has a provocative article about airlines and credit card fees.\u00a0\u00a0 He suggests that this is the next frontier in the fee war that airlines have been waging on customers for several years now.\u00a0\u00a0 He cites two discount carriers, Allegiant and Spirit as having de facto credit card fees. My Take While I share […]","og_url":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/","og_site_name":"Ask Mr Credit Card Blog","article_published_time":"2009-11-04T00:00:15+00:00","author":"Jason Steele","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Jason Steele","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/","url":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/","name":"Airlines And Credit Card Fees","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#website"},"datePublished":"2009-11-04T00:00:15+00:00","dateModified":"2009-11-04T00:00:15+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/18331587d05ff4eaeee29fd913227597"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/airlines-and-credit-card-fees\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Airlines And Credit Card Fees"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/","name":"Ask Mr Credit Card Blog","description":"Just another WordPress site","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/18331587d05ff4eaeee29fd913227597","name":"Jason Steele","url":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/author\/jsteele\/"}]}},"wps_subtitle":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9307"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9307\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askmrcreditcard.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}