Holiday ‘extras’ eating into holiday budget!

If you can’t go 4 hours without eating then the rest of the holiday will cost a lot too.

I booked a trip to Finland last night. I'm flying Stansted (very convenient airport) to Helsinki. Early flight which means I'll get to Tampere mid afternoon. Return fare £108.80 including a 10kg cabin bag. Haven't chosen a seat because I'm not bothered for a short flight. Out of interest I looked at the price of BA from. Heathrow (much less convenient airport). The cheapest one way flight on my day out was £190 and didn't get into Helsinki until after 11pm. The earliest BA flight that would get me to Tampere late afternoon cost £235 one way - over double the return fare I'm paying. Return would have cost me over £400 minimum at less convenient times. Sure I get a checked bag but I don't need one, I wonder how many passengers on that route do. Not sure it's Ryanair that's the rip off here.

Does everyone buy food at the airport and eat it on the plane?

I'm not saying don't eat. I'm saying bring your own or buy from Boots at the airport.

I know, my dd (21) is often 'starving' if she doesn't eat every few hours (a bit like me in fact 🤣). She ordered something like chicken terriaki on an easyjet flight. It was half the size of an average ready meal & had around 4 small pieces of dehydrated chicken for the bargain price of £10

Love how just about any thread on MN can be turned into a competition as to who can go the longest without food.

What sort of glutton would you have to be to even think about wanting to eat on a flight that's 'only' 4 hours long and that's before we consider the likely couple of hours of travel and airport faffing at either end.

You lost me with the food. Airline food is hideous, I always think they need to pay me to eat it! I really resent having to eat it when flying long haul. For a 4hr flight, there’s no way I’d consider it let alone pay for it. If you can’t go without food for 4 hours (??) take a snack from home surely?

We've been paying for air con in Greece for over 20 years. Turkey and Spain, no. Occasionally we haven't needed the air con, but when it's 30+, then yes. That's always factored in to the cost.

Tourist tax isn't that much.

Paying to sit together is annoying. Especially as on a package, that was always free. And it's totally a money spinner. I have bigger issues with plane seats though. I'm 5'9. I just need more room and a higher headrest so I can actually lean back.

Food thing.
It might be a 4 hour flight, but if you live 1 hour away(or more) from an airport, it could end up like this:
11am leave house.
12pm Airport
3pm fly
7pm land (or 9pm. Greece etc)

That's a long time to not eat.

You can't always bank on eating at the airport (mad busy/ long security/ traffic jam etc).

We've always taken a picnic with us.

The things you are quibbling over are less than a tenner each! If the budget is so tight you are concerned about £6 for a drop off, why not just holiday in the UK? Foreign holidays aren't mandatory. The flight food is also not mandatory, just have a coffee and a Boots meal deal at the terminal. I've also never encountered a hotel where you need to pay extra for the aircon, had no idea that was a thing.

These are unfortunately pretty standard on budget flights/ holidays, and are designed to give you choices.

tourist tax should however be included in the price unless it’s been introduced by local authorities after you initially booked the holiday

Genuinely think it’s this kind of bloody thievery that makes people think the country is ‘broken’.

Eh?

Absolutely agree with @Bingbopboomboomboombopbaam . Holidays abroad are not a necessity and holidays abroad have nothing to do with “Broken Britain”, what a bizarre analogy to use.

Plus, surely your allocated seats/transfers are included in your budget for the holiday itself, not part of “spends”?

Food for flight/at the airport, just takes backs and a packed lunch with you. It’s probably better food and saves you loads of money. You don’t “have” to buy food on the plane for such a short flight.

You need to factor all the costs in when budgeting for your holiday and if you can’t afford the extras, don’t go, it’s simple. Holidays are a luxury, not a necessity.

Love that you think this country is broken when talking about a holiday outside this country

We never pay for seats next to each other,.always still end up next to each other

Flight food is grim anyway - just bring some snacks /sandwiches?

• £22pp each way to get seats on the plane next to each other - surely you just pay this at time of booking and factor it into the cost of the flight? how many of you are there - we usually just sit with a kid each separately to save on seat costs.

• £8.50pp each way for a bit of food on the 4hr flight - can't you bring a packed lunch from home?

• £8 per night AC for the hotel room - the AC - are you even sure you need it yet?

• £8 per night tourist tax - nothing can be done factor it into the cost

Rather than thinking of all those extras as eating into your spending money, you have to factor them in as the actual cost of your holiday as you know you will pay these charges at the time of booking.

The airline I work for starts filling from seat 1A, 2B, 2C etc. However, if someone has booked a seat, they get that seat.

So for a party of three, it could be that the first available seat for "free" is 4D... then everything else is booked until 11A, then everything else is booked until 15B. So whilst it looks like we have purposefully split a party up, they are in the closest possible seats to each other without paying.

This is not RyanAir, who I believe do it deliberately.

I think Pret at the airport could easily cost you £10!

@Revolutioniser food on a 4 hr delight is a want not a need . You are making a choice and that money doesn’t Need to be spent.
4hrs do you all have to sit together ?
what age is everyone ?

Feel really stupid now!! Didn’t realise I could skip it!

However, at least now I have a window seat - not had one of those in 20 years as both my kids are autistic and like those seats, so I’m regarding it as a treat this time. I will be back in 10 days to start an AIBU thread about being asked to move seats by a family who haven’t paid/booked and the row on the plane when I politely decline, having paid for my seat 🤣

But that’s the Op’s point. The price of seat included you sitting next to the people you booked with. Even on budget lines .

It’s only recently that you need to guarantee this by paying an additional fee. And it’s fine to say “budget” for it but you can’t know how much these additional costs are until you’ve gone through all the pages and ignore the advertised price. They change price for each flight.

This is ridiculous. The country is not broken because you can not afford snacks on a plane flight. 🙄

You don't have to pay for seats on any airline. You just skip past the seat selection part and it will choose for you for free.

DP and I never pay for seats on any of Ryanair, Jet2 or Easyjet and are nearly always together. Only time I've ever paid for seats was when I was taking a relative on her first ever flight, which was on Ryanair and I did want to make sure we were next to each other.

Tourist taxes will be everywhere soon. It’s not too bad at the moment and has to be factored in, but it’ll go up and up to a point where it’ll put people off going completely, which is its point ( in my opinion anyway )
It should also be made clearer at booking what it’ll be.

Always worth checking if the airport has a water fountain and then you can get water for free. We do this at Gatwick, saves on single use plastic as well. Many countries have safe tap water as well so you can then use your bottle while you're away as well.