Searches to Caribbean plummet as APD bites
Sunday, 26 Oct, 2010
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Searches for holidays in Barbados have fallen by almost a quarter on Cheapflights.co.uk since November last year as steeper APD charges kicked in.
The site reports searches to Jamaica are down 13.2% while overall Caribbean searches to eight destinations have fallen 11.6%. Barbados searches have fallen by 23%.
Last November APD levels for customers wanting to travel to the Caribbean shot up as the destination was placed into band C. This meant economy passengers had to pay £50 tax per seat and premium cabin travellers paid a £100 per seat levy.
This November, APD is set to soar again, with economy passengers to the Caribbean paying an additional £25 and premium passengers an extra £50.
Cheapflights notes that its findings are in keeping with a recent statement from Caribbean Tourist Office’s secretary general Hugh Riley that UK passenger numbers to the region had fallen following the tax rise in November last year by 12.2%.
Cheapflights’ global sales director Francesca Ecsery said: “APD is a regressive tax and it is evident that it hurts not only those consumers least able to afford it, but also all those economies dependent on tourism from the UK.
“Faced with such statistics, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that APD is having a significantly negative effect on travel from the UK to the Caribbean. A family of four travelling economy class from the UK (or returning home to the Caribbean) will have to pay £300 (US$473.25) in tax as from November 1. Premium class will pay double that!
“It’s no wonder that tourism ministers from the CTO have been lobbying the UK Government to at least relegate the Caribbean into Band B.”
Caribbean Tourism Organisation director of marketing for UK and Europe Carol Hay said: “We are very concerned to hear of the variance in Cheapflights UK’s year-on-year search traffic for Caribbean destinations since the launch of the four tier Air Passenger Duty last November. We appreciate there may be many factors at play in such statistics; however it adds weight to our argument to politicians that all destinations and all British travellers are being affected by such high taxation.”
by Dinah Hatch
Dinah
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