> Yes, they are duty free - but they're all charging about twice the high-street price.
Same as ZERO COMMISSION EXCHANGE outfits that, yes, charge 0% commission on the receipt but have jacked up all exchange rates by 10% instead…
Same as ZERO COMMISSION EXCHANGE outfits that, yes, charge 0% commission on the receipt but have jacked up all exchange rates by 10% instead…
then, even worse, the fact that they "announce" your gate only 30 minutes before embarking! .... they do not want you to sit in a chair if front of your gate.. absolutely not! they want you to hang around and spend.
but, the worst: when they heat the water in the toilets so you cannot drink it! In Greece they even put a fake "not potable" sign, so you sure buy the world's higher overpriced bottle of water.
My state is split down the middle and I'm in the soda half.
yes, of course
As for pollution, maybe if they were building more nuclear plants and high speed chargers, then electric vehicles would actually be a better option for longer distance travel. Of course not counting the environmental impact of building a bunch of new vehicles vs. the one that I've had for over 7 years.
If you don't have to get somewhere at specific times and events, no problem, just chill and you'll get there eventually. If going to a planned meeting, or giving a talk, etc., it can be very tiring.
You still have to deal with security theatre.
You’re still treated as cattle.
You’re still at the mercy of delays, bumps, last minute gate changes.
You still have to deal with a puny amount of luggage.
You still have to pay for every little thing (lounge access to relax, drinks/food inflight, the privilege of taking checked in luggage)
You’re till siting in a tiny aluminum tube with your knees under your chin for hours on end, preferably with a kid kicking the back of your flimsy seat the whole way.
You still have to waste copious amounts of time going to and from the airport.
You still get your luggage lost/delayed/damaged and having to deal with overworked + underpaid people to try and get compensated.
I could go on. I hate the miserable experience of flying and it seems like airports + carriers are always innovating to find ways to make it even worse.
There seems to be a deliberate fog of war around travel requirements. The specifics of the rules are different everywhere (take my shoes off? belt off? laptop in my bag or out of my bag? ...). Which is slightly annoying in itself but what is really annoying is the lack of explanation of what those specific requirements are at any one airport. Which means inevitably being yelled at by security staff, feeling stupid, setting off scanners accidentally etc. It's all very unpleasant.
With lack of signage by TSA to describe the airport-specific rules. Makes TSA folks appear busy by seizing my water bottle after arriving int'l and getting caught by TSA for onward flight. And specific taxes pay for this bureaucracy.
And you take them seriously, until you take a flight in Argentina and they tell you you can take aboard as much water you want ahhahaah
omg, you say, will be a safe flight? hahaha
of course.
Is actually to maximize surface area for airplanes to park in a single terminal. Next airport trip, pull out a gps and look at where you are walking.
>announce your gate 30 minutes
The airline you are flying on only has X number of gates but X+y planes at that given time. So they will hold off on gate numbers to optimally fit you in. Lots of pilots talking to ATC telling them they don’t have gate info from their carrier yet
I understand it may appear as though they are trying to get you, but they are trying to be efficient
Also I don't believe your efficiency story, there are plenty of cases where it's possible to know the gate ahead of time, and plenty of reasons for airports not to want people congregating at the gate as soon as they get airside.
exactly, sometimes even flight radar tells you the gate, but the main displays in the airport will tell you the gate number only 30 minutes before: Istanbul (IST) is my main reference here: what I do is I just go to any personnel and gently ask for the gate for my flight telling them I need to sit down and rest: they quickly check and tell me.
I have no proof, but I do believe that those 30 mins only advance notification are planned so not to have me sitting down in a comfortable chair for hours not spending money.
yes, but I am not talking about the structure, the "concrete": I am talking about the walking way inside big open areas that makes you walk from A to B in a zigzag pattern: it is a bit like having salt and sugar in different places in a supermarket, which makes you go all around the supermarket (which is planned, no doubt, even moving those places every x months).
I am 100% sure that the super expensive rent a shop pays in an airport goes along with the guarantee that a number of X passengers will pass in front of it every day: you need to maximize the model, so what do you do?
anything goes
In my experience, I was able to purchase 0.50€ water at airports in Athens, Mykonos and Santorini. One trick that I saw some merchants use was to not to sell bottled water at all, or claim it had ran out, and that they only had 7€ Gatorade or whatever.
oh, good to know, thanks.
I recall a crazy price for Perrier (something I would never buy myself): it was Cefalonia airport where tab water is (or at least it was 10 years ago) super fine, and in the toilet there was a fake hand made "water is not drinkable" sign (only in the main bathroom btw ahhaaha): I remember my friend needed to drink and ended up buying Perrier and not drinking from the sink as we were doing.
Inexperienced (euro-pampered) me went to a money exchange place that charged a fee because I know it costs money for them to have random icelandic kronar on hand so that's fair, then they don't need hidden fees right? I also knew the bank from name, it's a household name in my country.
Later at home I checked and I paid out of my ass for the exchange rate, never mind the fee on top...
I thought I was being clever by doing it at departure where you can compare and say no. At the destination airport, you have no choice but to exchange, everyone will need the local currency to pay for things and so I thought it's better to be prepared than potentially be paying the prices of the desperate. Yeah. No.
(A few hours of air time later, I learned that in Iceland you just pay by bank card for everything at iirc 0.3% fee and you don't need to exchange no cash.)
An even better solution is to get a card like TransferWise (revolut are exploitative assholes and I don’t recommend enabling this employee exploiter) that charges very very reasonable rates so that you don’t even need to exchange or can use an atm if cash is required.
Can you get cash out of local atm machines using your foreign card?
It seems bizarre to shuffle around the cost structure like that, but I guess it's a marketing thing that works because most people don't know any better?
So yeah it works as intended. Same trick as advertising prices without taxes, tips, cleaning fees, and other mandatory fees you’ll end up paying.