Rather than eliminate redundant services, surveys and studies that can be delayed, the FAA has decided to generate maximum pain on passengers. Furloughs are scheduled to kick in on Sunday.
Mandatory travel user fees associated with flying are not dropping. Why are travelers who pay these fees being threatened with cutbacks in services that they pay for every time they fly, go through security or re-enter the country?
But, suffer they will starting this weekend, according to DOT, while entire departments that only affect the traveling public peripherally will remain unscathed. It seems that the cuts have been designed to generate maximum public pain.
Releasing the news on a Thursday afternoon, with cutbacks scheduled for the following Sunday, is the news equivalent of letting the public know after the deed is done. According to reports in DC Capitol Hill papers,
Chicago O’Hare, which is troublesome on a normal day, is projected to have the worst average delay at 50 minutes, with a maximum of 132 minutes. JFK’s average wait time was estimated at 12 minutes and a maximum of 50 minutes, while LaGuardia would see an average wait time of 30 minutes and a maximum of 80.
Los Angeles’s average wait time was put at 10 minutes and a maximum of 67 minutes, while Newark’s average wait time was put at 20 minutes and a maximum of 51 minutes. Other airports on the list likely to see “significant delays” include Fort Lauderdale, Miami, San Diego, Philadelphia, Charlotte, Chicago Midway and San Francisco.
These delays were calculated using a computer simulation based on running the system with 10 percent fewer controllers, but did not take into account the ripple effects from delays at the nation’s biggest airport.
In a letter to the Secretary of Transportation, Rep. Shuster, chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, and John Thune, the ranking member, noted a series of savings that could have been implemented rather than inconveniencing the traveling public.
These areas include, but are not limited to: a yearly travel budget for FAA employees of $179 million; a fleet of 46 aircraft that costs $143 million a year to maintain; a 41 percent, or $3 billion budget increase since 2002, even though domestic flights are down 27 percent from 2000 traffic levels; and clear mismanagement and waste on Air Traffic Control modernization contracts.
Making matters worse, travelers are getting shortchanged for something that they specifically pay for when they buy airline tickets. All passengers pay user fees when they fly anywhere. These user fees generate more than 80 percent of the FAA budget and should not be subject to sequestration of general funds.
According to the letter sent to Sec. LaHood from Bill Shuster and John Thune, the payments were $12 billion last year in excise taxes.
The flying public paid over $12 billion in excise taxes and user fees in 2012, yet these are the people the FAA has chosen to inconvenience because of its lack of planning and inability to produce credible and specific data on budget cuts and constraints.
Specifically, here are the user fees passengers pay:
7.5 percent Excise Tax
9/11 Security Fee = $2.50 per flight number to a maximum of $5 per one-way or $10 per roundtrip
Federal Segment Fee = $3.90 per takeoff or landing (maximum of $15.60)
Passenger Facility Charges (PFCs) = up to $18
When traveling internationally, we have to pay additional user fees to take off and land, to have our passports checked and our luggage inspected for customs.
International Departure Tax = $17.20
International Arrival Tax = $17.20
Immigration user fee = $7
Customs user fee = $5.50
U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service fee = $5
The cries coming from consumers, airlines, travel organization and Congress have been loud and clear.
Shuster has been quoted as saying, “I believe he (Obama) is instructing his agencies to do things that inflict the most pain on the most people. This should be laid right at the President’s feet.”
Let’s take another look.
At least keep New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago airspace fully staffed. When delays show up in those regions, the domino effect is dramatic across the country. Study after study shows that kind of action is counterproductive.
For the FAA to say that their study did not “include possible ripple effects throughout the country,” is mind boggling. What is the brain trust at FAA thinking?
Charlie Leocha is the President of Travelers United. He has been working in Washington, DC, for the past 14 years with Congress, the Department of Transportation, and industry stakeholders on travel issues. He was the first consumer representative to the Advisory Committee for Aviation Consumer Protections appointed by the Secretary of Transportation from 2012 through 2018.
