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The airline industry is protesting against the planned and announced increase in airline charges, which will cause problems for carriers, regional airports and passengers.
On 23rd August 2021, the aviation industry sent an open letter to the Polish Prime Minister regarding the drastic increase in charges related to the provision of air navigation services in Poland, in particular at Polish regional airports.
The Polish Air Navigation Services Agency collects two charges related to providing the air navigation services in Poland. These are: Terminal Navigation Charges, i.e. the rate collected by the Polish Air Navigation Services Agency for servicing aircraft during take-off and landing at each airport, and Enroute Navigation Charges, collected for each flight of an aircraft in the airspace controlled by air traffic control (depending on the distance covered in the airspace).
Proposal to increase charges from 1 January 2022:
1) terminal charges (for a single flight operation):
a) for F. Chopin Airport from PLN 343.08 in 2021 to PLN 524.58 – an increase by PLN 181.50 (increase by 53%);
b) for Regional Airports from PLN 791,12 in 2021 to PLN 1,347.76 – an increase by PLN 556,64 (increase by 70%);
2) en route - from PLN 195.70 in 2021 to PLN 245.81 - an increase of PLN 50.11 (increase by 26%).
“Such a drastic increase will result in a loss of competitiveness for the Polish aviation market in the single European sky, and will also deprive Polish regional airports of their competitiveness. This, in turn, will result in the underutilisation of their capacity, and will directly affect the blocking of the recovery of aviation and passenger traffic after the COVID-19 pandemic. Already before (before the COVID-19 pandemic), the existing charges in Poland essentially discriminated against Polish Regional Airports, as in 2019 the average terminal charge rate in Europe was EUR 166.00, when for F. Chopin Airport the charge was EUR 90.00 and for Polish Regional Airports it was EUR 181.00" – as it was written the open letter.
On 7th September 2021 Tomasz Kloskowski, the President of Gdansk Airport wrote to the Minister of Infrastructure: "I oppose any increase in fees for airlines. These increases will be passed on to passengers in the increased price of airline tickets, and passengers are the least to blame for the COVID-19 pandemic. Passing on the effects of the pandemic to aviation industry players (including Polish airlines, Polish airports, Polish tour operators and other companies) economically battered for the last year and a half is, in my view, a disastrous idea. It may result in carriers withdrawing from certain Polish airports, or in a restricted network of air links from Polish airports. In my view, this is practically destroying the Polish aviation market that we have built up over many years”.
On 22 September 2021, the owners of Gdansk Airport, the local governments of Gdansk, Gdynia and Sopot and the Pomeranian Voivodeship protested against "the destruction of the well-developing aviation market at the local level and the attempt to pass on the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic to regional airports and airlines, and thus to passengers, the inhabitants of the region". "We strongly oppose any increase in charges: terminal and en-route charges, proposed by the Polish Air Navigation Agency and supported by the Polish government. In a pandemic, airlines, ports and tour operators are fighting for survival every day. Their financial figures indicate multimillion-dollar losses. And the announced increases will hit them directly once again," they wrote in a letter to the Polish Prime Minister.
On 27 September 2021 provincial councillors protested against the increase of charges at airports. They adopted an appeal to the Prime Minister and the Minister of Infrastructure in connection with the announced increases in terminal and route charges. The voivodeship councillors are concerned about the communication exclusion of the voivodeship.
On 29 September 2021, a meeting of the Standing Subcommittee on Air Transport was held in the Polish Parliament to discuss the planned increases in navigation charges for airlines.
"After listening to the speeches of many MPs from different political options, I hope that there is a very good chance to reach an agreement across divisions, which will allow PANSA (Polish Air Navigation Services Agency) to be subsidized from the state budget and not burdening airlines, and thus passengers, with additional increases. Thanks to such a solution everyone will win: the government, the opposition, the whole aviation industry, and above all, passengers". - said Tomasz Kloskowski, the President of the Board of Gdansk Airport.