Many Irish can’t afford to visit Ireland in high summer due to ticket costs

Less competition on North Atlantic route to Ireland has led to much higher fares

Larger Text

Print

E-mail

24 Comments

High summer prices for trans-Atlantic airline tickets are making it impossible for Irish emigrants to travel home

Photo by Google Images

Tweet

In the summer months, high ticket prices dissuade Irish emigrants and visitors from journeying to Ireland. Many of Ireland’s six million yearly visitors schedule flights from June to August and a high percentage of those come from the U.S.

At press time, a round-trip ticket from New York City’s JFK Airport to Shannon Airport costs approximately $2,200, and to Dublin Airport costs approximately $1,500. And it’s nearly the same price from Boston.

“I am not going home to Ireland this summer. It’s too expensive this time of year,” says Kathy McDermott, an Irish mother. “For me just to buy two tickets to Ireland, it would cost more than an entire week in Long Beach Island (a resort community in New Jersey), all expenses paid, for a family of four.”

Peter Kelly, an Irish laborer, says, “A buddy of mine needed to go back home for family reasons. When it was all said and done, he ended up paying over three [thousand dollars] on tickets.”

Ireland’s three international airline carriers – Aer Lingus, Delta Airlines and United Airlines – attribute the increase primarily to rising fuel costs.

In fact, Aer Lingus CEO Christoph Mueller lauded his company’s 2011 performance amid “a difficult backdrop of non-controllable fuel price inflation, increased airport charges and challenging demand conditions in our primary markets.”

However, fuel surcharges – fees that allow airline carriers to compensate for fuel price inflation – have risen twice as fast as fuel prices in the last year. According to a study by corporate travel management company Carson Wagonlit Travel, airline carriers have not reduced fuel surcharges since 2009, despite drops in fuel prices over that time.

Norman Crampton, a Co. Leitrim native and operator of Tara Travel in Yonkers, NY, explains that airline carriers engage in a risky procedure known as fuel hedging, whereby a fixed cost reduces their exposure to potentially volatile fuel costs.

“Every carrier engages in fuel hedging, but they don’t reveal the hedge price to the public,” says Crampton. “If the market dictates a fuel price lower than the hedge price, the airline could lose money.”

Dympna Tully, a Co. Cavan native and operator of Tully Travel in Yonkers, NY, believes that “less competition and fewer flights” encourage high ticket prices.

In the past, several airline carriers competed for transatlantic dominion, including: American Airlines, Northwest Airlines, Pan American World Airways and Trans World Airlines. Due to financial difficulties or merger opportunities, however, only three carriers currently travel between Ireland and the U.S.

Print

E-mail

Tweet