The National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC) has rejected Aena’s proposal to raise airport taxes by just under 1% for next year 2025 and, in exchange, will keep them frozenin line with the claims of several airlines such as Ryanair.
The regulator has chosen keep stable one of the indicators that set these prices, the Maximum Revenue per Adjusted Passenger (IMAAJ), which will continue for another year in 10.35 euros per passenger. He justifies the decision by the fact that Aena’s traffic forecast was “too conservative”, which has facilitated historic results for the airport manager that it will now try to reverse.
To maintain this amount and balance it with the variations in income and costs of the different airport services, the CNMC proposes to carry out 5% increases in landing, security, parking and service fees for people with reduced mobility (PMR). In exchange, will drop 3.51% the amounts of transit services through the aerodrome, use of infrastructure, telescopic walkways, handlingcatering and fuel, ensuring that the final increase is 0%.
The company led by Maurici Lucena revised its annual traffic estimates in June after accumulating historical traffic records in many of the national airports. Then its central passenger estimate rose by 8.3%, a value that pointed to exceed 300 million passengers in Spain. More than 266 million travelers passed through its airports until the end of October, 9.4% more than in 2023
Moncloa supported the rise
Both the Government and the company led by Maurici Lucena defended the need to raise airport taxes to cope with rising costs derived from inflation and increased traffic. The increase, which was equivalent to about 40 euro cents per passenger, was defended by Aena and the Ministry of Transport under the pretext that current rates are 6.9% lower than a decade ago.
In general, airlines have passed this increase on to travelerssomething that has contributed to airline tickets accumulating increases of up to 10% during the last year, as companies such as Ryanair have recognized. The Irish firm, which committed up to 5,000 million in new routes, planes and projects for Spain for the remainder of the decade, led the offensive against the increase in airport fees and hinted at a possible reduction in its investment.
To avoid this scenario, Aena and the Government invented a incentive model that already offers bonuses to airlines to demonstrate that they have carried more passengers during the year, in order to boost traffic growth and decongest large airfields. This system applies to facilities with less than 3 million passengers per year, 32 throughout Spain, and which are usually used by low-cost firms, which are more sensitive to increases in fixed costs.
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