Passengers are set to pay less for flights from Heathrow after regulators ordered the airport to slash landing fees.
The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) said charges for airlines will fall to £23.73 per passenger in 2025 and £23.71 in 2026.
That compares to previously proposed caps of £25.24 and £25.28 respectively.
The decision follows a ruling from the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in October, which weighed in on the row between Heathrow and airlines, including British Airways and Virgin Atlantic.
The UK’s largest airport had argued that it should be allowed to charge as much as £40 per passenger to recoup its pandemic-driven losses.
Fee row: Airlines have accused Heathrow of trying to price-gouge customers and pushed for it to cut landing fees
But airlines said the airport was trying to price-gouge customers, and pushed for cuts.
Charges are typically passed on to passengers through their tickets. However John Grant, expert at aviation consultancy OAG, said the passengers’ savings would be limited.
‘Airport fees and charges are a very small part of an airlines operating costs,’ he said, adding that fares had already gone up.
The landing fees news came as Heathrow revealed bumper passenger numbers with 81.9m passing through in the year to the end of June, up 13 per cent year-on-year.
This included over 7m passengers last month alone and its busiest day ever on June 30, when 268,000 passengers jetted through its terminals.
The figures come as the group undergoes a shareholder shake-up. Last month private equity group Ardian and Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund agreed to buy a 38 per cent stake for £3.3billion.
The Public Investment Fund (PIF), controlled by Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, is estimated to have more than £550billion in assets.
Campaigners have attacked PIF’s swoop on Heathrow because of the country’s dubious human rights record.
The Government has the power to block deals on national security concerns. But it is unclear whether it would step in as PIF builds its stake. Qatar Investment Authority is also a major shareholder, with a 20 per cent holding.
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