Purchasing Airline Tickets Online

[Ella18]

Hi all,

I am new to this group but I have a quick question(s) which I hope you can help me with. My boyfriend is Argentinian (living in Buenos Aires) and wants to purchase airline tickets for me to come visit him (I am currently living in Ireland). He has been looking at ways to avoid the Argentinian surcharges and taxes so I suggested buying the tickets online via Paypal, however reading some of the forums here I can see that this may not be an option.

He has an Argentinian credit card synced to a Paypal account so if he was to buy the tickets online via Paypal would he avoid the 15 percent on international purchases? Also, because the ticket is originating in Dublin and not Buenos Aires, does this mean he technically is not liable to pay the 20 percent surcharge?

And finally, if Paypal is not an option can anyone suggest any way to avoid the extra surcharges?

Any advice or experience is greatly appreciated!

Thank you in advance!

 

[JoeGillis]

Hi all,

I am new to this group but I have a quick question(s) which I hope you can help me with. My boyfriend is Argentinian (living in Buenos Aires) and wants to purchase airline tickets for me to come visit him (I am currently living in Ireland). He has been looking at ways to avoid the Argentinian surcharges and taxes so I suggested buying the tickets online via Paypal, however reading some of the forums here I can see that this may not be an option.

He has an Argentinian credit card synced to a Paypal account so if he was to buy the tickets online via Paypal would he avoid the 15 percent on international purchases? Also, because the ticket is originating in Dublin and not Buenos Aires, does this mean he technically is not liable to pay the 20 percent surcharge?

And finally, if Paypal is not an option can anyone suggest any way to avoid the extra surcharges?

Any advice or experience is greatly appreciated!

Thank you in advance!

I believe the catch in this case is the fact that your friend's CC is issued in Argentina, which means it may be almost impossible to avoid paying the additional 15 and/or 20% surcharge/tax, for the purchase is based on the point of sale (not point of origin), in this case Argentina, using an Argentine issued credit card, which is linked to an Argentine credit card data base. Definitely I could be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure this is the case for travel to/from Argentina using Argentine CCs.

 

[Peony54]

I don't know about the 15%- but he won't be charged the 20% for travel since you are flying out of Ireland

 

[internationalguy]

There's a hole in this explanation but maybe someone can fill in. The 20% is nothing more than a govt trying to cut back on people taking advantage of the official exchange rate when making foreign purchases with Argentine credit cards. The thing is it costs the govt every time an argie uses their credit card abroad so that 20% fee is a way to discourage people from making too many foreign purchases and making the exchange rate effectively 20% higher so people won't take advantage of getting those dollars (that they technically need to make foreign purchases) at the official rate. The same applies for international airline tickets (even those paid in cash) because all international airfares are quoted in USD. Then again the government has to honor the official rate in those cases. Charging the 20% for airline tickets paid in pesos or with argie cards prevents an even bigger depletion of govt. dollar reserves. (at this point the only kicker is that I'm not sure if non residents are waived the 20% fee when paying cash).

If you pay with a foreign (Irish) card, you won't be charged the 20% at all. You will however lose the implied discount you get when making purchases in pesos and having the possibility of using blue pesos for those purchases. Basically.. a 1,000 USD airfare at the official rate would cost 5,600 ARS plus the 20% (6,720). If you were to take those 1,000 USDs exchange them in Florida St. you would get 9,200 pesos for the same 1,000 USDs. Basically you would buy the same plane ticket but you would have around 2,500 pesos left even after paying the 20%.

 

[Crema Americana]

I may be wrong, buy I think the 20% only applies if he buys from an Argentine based dealer/agency for travel originating in Argentina. Buy from the .com and not the .com.ar site. This may be unavoidable if using Aerolineas Argentinas. You will see the tax added when you buy.

As for the 15% (now 20%?), he may have to pay that since it's spending abroad (if paying a foreign company.) Technically I think it's supposed to be for goods, not services, so it may not apply. This charge is put on your statement. Even with that, it's still better than paying in dollars or euros.

 

[gpop]

I recently purchased from Air Canada. Made the reservation online and paid cash (hoping I could avoid surcharges if I purchased with cash as opposed to a CC purchase) at the storefront on Cordoba; the surcharge is 20% and what's interesting (and utterly infuriating) is that at least 3 concepts (Argentina Airport Tax, Argentina Intl. Ticket Tax, and Argentina Security Tax) are charged by Argentine gov. in US DOLLARS BEFORE the subtotal then once it was all tallied up THEN they charged the 20%.

So much for peso-fying the system.

This is a way to warm you up to the 20% screwing your gonna get at the end of the deal.

 

[nikad]

I may be wrong, buy I think the 20% only applies if he buys from an Argentine based dealer/agency for travel originating in Argentina. Buy from the .com and not the .com.ar site. This may be unavoidable if using Aerolineas Argentinas. You will see the tax added when you buy.

As for the 15% (now 20%?), he may have to pay that since it's spending abroad (if paying a foreign company.) Technically I think it's supposed to be for goods, not services, so it may not apply. This charge is put on your statement. Even with that, it's still better than paying in dollars or euros.

Anything in foreign currency, no matter what pays 20% if you are using an Arg credit card. Paypal will show up as a foreign currency transaction and he will pay 20%. The only way to bypass this is to buy the ticket abroad with a foreign credit card. This however will result in a more expensive ticket. He should just suck it up and think he is still saving 30-35% by using his Arg credit card. Moreover if he buys in pesos in payments, inflation will magically make those payments look really really cheap.

 

[nikad]

I recently purchased from Air Canada. Made the reservation online and paid cash (hoping I could avoid surcharges if I purchased with cash as opposed to a CC purchase) at the storefront on Cordoba; the surcharge is 20% and what's interesting (and utterly infuriating) is that at least 3 concepts (Argentina Airport Tax, Argentina Intl. Ticket Tax, and Argentina Security Tax) are charged by Argentine gov. in US DOLLARS BEFORE the subtotal then once it was all tallied up THEN they charged the 20%.

So much for peso-fying the system.

This is a way to warm you up to the 20% screwing your gonna get at the end of the deal.

There must be a worldwide agreement on airport taxes for sure.

 

[CamaroMan]

Hi - i know this thread is old, but i wish to buy an airline ticket from brazil overseas using an argentine bank card - has anyone done this? and what taxes did you pay? very interested - i will also start a new thread

 

[mikic007]

With cc you might be able to buy it, worked for me always, but not for everyone. You will pay official dolar price + 35%.