by JuicyPuffin

Created on: December 07, 2011   Last Updated: December 08, 2011

There are three types of airline fees. They include unavoidable fees, middleman fees, and complication fees. The unavoidable fees are the base fees that the airline company has to charge you in order to stay in business, such as the gas cost of the flight, employees' wages, and to cover their own taxes. Typically the airline must charge you a fuel surcharge that is based on how long your flight is and where your flight is originating from, government taxes and other government fees, and a booking fee whether or not you paid via website or in person.

Middleman fees are usually harder to avoid if you have connecting flights, but are manageable. The first step is to book your tickets via website, and this website should be the official website of the actual airline you're flying with. If you need to switch airlines for a connecting flight, book your connection on their own website as well. This can help save you middleman fees for the service that calculates and books both flights at once. Based on my personal experience, even if you use a service such as Orbitz that claims to have the lowest costs, the official airline website will always have the lowest costs unless you have some kind of large discount.

Complication fees are especially numerous in American airline companies, but since they always have outlining rules when they occur, you can easily avoid them. Some airlines will give you a fee if you don't print your boarding ticket at home and bring it to them, and they label that as a paper printing cost. Excess baggage fees are extremely common, and if you are unable to find the free luggage restrictions on their web-page you should call them to find this out. You can be charged even $100 for a small additional suitcase if you're not careful. Ambitious airlines may even charge you a fee if you check-in in person instead of using their electronic, passport-scanning machines. There is also almost always an optional traveler's health insurance and flight insurance charge.

Traveler's health insurance is in most cases extremely unnecessary. Not only is it very unlikely that you will become ill enough to need it, but often your regular health insurance will cover you when you are abroad anyway. Flight insurance, or booking change insurance, should only be needed occasionally. If you are in doubt about if your flight dates might be in conflict with something then it is definitely best to buy flight insurance, as the fees for changing your ticket otherwise are usually

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