The investigation of the case of overbooking on the Ural Airlines flight ended with a puff. But the precedent was so close. Overbooking, that is, a situation where more tickets are sold for a flight than seats on an airplane, is not regulated in any way in Russian legislation, but it happens all the time.
Usually, the transport prosecutor’s office, upon learning about overbooking, initiates an administrative offense case under the article “Provision of services to the public that do not meet the requirements of regulatory legal acts.” The airline’s punishment for it is 30 thousand rubles. – What an elephant is a pellet. But the case, which AN-Tourism wrote about in No. 39, initially differed from the traditional reaction of the supervisory authorities – the Ural Transport Prosecutor’s Office, due to the fact of overbooking on the Sochi – Yekaterinburg flight in August this year, initiated a case against Ural Airlines under the article “Consumer fraud”. According to this article, a legal entity faces a fine from 100 to 500 thousand rubles. And after the inspection, the decision of the supervisory authority became known: the transport prosecutor appointed the airline punishment in the form of … a warning. That is, this time there was even a symbolic fine of 30 thousand rubles. The Ural Transport Prosecutor’s Office, describing the decision, qualified such “cruel” measures in its message as “measures taken to protect the rights of passengers during air transportation.” Yes, there is no precedent when an airline is adequately punished for overbooking.
In October, by the way, attempts continued to prescribe overbooking in the legislative field: the All-Russian Association of Passengers proposed to oblige the carrier to pay customers monetary compensation for overbooking, and State Duma deputies asked the Ministry of Transport at the legislative level to prohibit airlines from selling more tickets than there are passenger seats on each particular flight. But the Ministry of Transport is apparently satisfied with everything at the moment: “We do not plan to legalize overbooking. We closely monitor the airlines to avoid such situations when a passenger arrives with a purchased ticket and does not get on the flight. These failures must be resolved by carriers in a legal manner,” said Transport Minister Roman Starovoit.
Tour tax
The tourist tax, which will replace the resort fee from 2025 and which is allowed to be introduced by all subjects of the Russian Federation, continues its march across the country. It’s time to tell not about where the local authorities decided to introduce the tax, but about whether there are regions in Russia that are not thinking about introducing a new tax.
We have already written about the fact that the city of Vladivostok in Primorye introduces a tourist tax, and then three more urban districts of the region – Khasansky, Nakhodka and Ussuriysky – decided on the introduction of a new tax. In the Altai Territory, the tourist tax will be introduced in the cities of Slavgorod and Rubtsovsk. There is no doubt that Belokurikha will not stand aside either, on the territory of which a resort fee is charged from 2018 to the present. In Tambov, at the next meeting of the Tambov City Duma, they want to consider the issue of establishing a tourist tax on the territory of the city district – the city of Tambov.
Meanwhile, the law itself continues to be adjusted towards increasing the types of accommodation facilities – an amendment has been adopted to include guest houses and sanatoriums in the register of accommodation facilities.
Trends of the winter season
One of the major domestic travel planning services analyzed the hotel bookings of its customers from December to February. It turned out that the popularity of trips abroad continues to grow: 58% of Russian tourists will go there this winter, which is 18% more than a year ago. In Russia, Moscow became the most popular city for winter holidays, St. Petersburg took the second place, and Esto-Sadok closes the top three leaders. Thailand leads the top foreign destinations – customers of the service book hotels in Phuket, Bangkok and Pattaya. And in general, there is an increase in demand for the Asian destination, so in Nha Trang (Vietnam) three times more hotels were booked than last season. It should be noted that the demand for Milan hotels has also tripled – that is, tourists have adapted to the difficulties awaiting them on their way to Europe. But in Istanbul, on the contrary, housing is chosen twice as often.
Visa News
The French Visa Center in Moscow officially announced that from November 1, when applying for a visa to this country, not personally, but through a representative, it is mandatory to provide a notarized power of attorney for a third party in a package of documents. Previously, they managed with a simple written form. However, close relatives (spouses, children, parents) can still apply upon presentation of documents confirming the relationship.
And in France itself, they announced the preservation of border controls until April 2025 due to terrorist threats and illegal migration. Recall that currently the same control within the Schengen area operates on the borders of Austria, Germany, Norway, Sweden and Denmark.
Sweden has stopped accepting documents through visa centers in Russia. The main reason: “the limited human resources of the Swedish Embassy in Moscow.” “Applications for a Schengen visa to Sweden are temporarily impossible to submit either at the embassy or at VFS Global. Exceptions are possible only for urgent cases when the application can be submitted directly at the embassy,” the statement on the website of the country’s visa application center says.
Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia Alexander Vulin, against the background of increased pressure on the Balkan countries from the EU, made an important statement for Russian tourists. He said that, despite pressure from the West, Serbia will not cancel either the visa-free regime with the Russian Federation or direct flights to Russia.
In Thailand, they again recalled the introduction of a tourist tax. This time, the Minister of Tourism and Sports, Sorawong Thienthong, made a proposal to introduce it in January 2025. The amount is still the same – 300 baht (about 900 rubles). The issue of introducing this long-suffering fee has been raised every year since 2013. The last time it was going to be introduced on January 1, 2024, but in December 2023, the decision was once again postponed. In June of this year, Prime Minister Sretta Tavisin announced the rejection of the introduction of a tourist tax, but less than four months later, they started talking about it again.
Excessive tourism
The authorities of Venice are increasing the fee for tourists arriving in the city for one day – the municipal council of the city approved a resolution according to which, in 2025, on certain days, a fee for a one-day visit to the “Italian pearl” will be reintroduced. The new levy scheme is significantly different from the one that was implemented this year. The changes, of course, are increasing: the deadlines have been extended, the number of days has been almost doubled, the cost of the “entrance ticket” has been increased when paying less than four days before arrival in Venice – 10 euros. Venice Mayor Luigi Brugnaro also announced that in 2025 the city will begin fining tourists who violate these rules. We were going to the current one, but it never came to strict measures. Let’s see what happens in 2025.
The French authorities want to charge an entrance fee to Notre Dame Cathedral – the country’s Minister of Culture Rashida Dati proposes to charge tourists an entrance fee to Notre Dame de Paris for 5 euros, and the proceeds should be fully directed to the protection of France’s religious heritage. According to the official’s calculations, this approach will allow to collect 75 million euros a year and “save all French churches.”
German industry portal Holidu.de with the participation of employees of the Institute of Economic Research, based on data from Euromonitor International, a rating of the busiest tourist cities in Europe was compiled. The leader of the rating was the Croatian Dubrovnik, where there are as many as 27 tourists per inhabitant. This city has always attracted attention with its architecture, but in recent years, fans of the series “Game of Thrones” have been coming here more and more often. Experts recommend visiting Dubrovnik in September or October to avoid crowds. Next up: Rhodes (Greece) – 26 tourists per local resident, Venice (Italy) – 21, Heraklion (Greece) – 18, Florence (Italy) – 13, Reykjavik (Iceland) – 12, Amsterdam (Netherlands) – 12, Lisbon (Portugal) – 11, Porto (Portugal) – 10 and Dublin (Ireland) – 9.
Despite the fact that in Spain, local residents are most often opposed to excessive tourism (last week there were actions in Madrid and Barcelona again), Spain is recognized as the best country for summer tourism in Europe in 2024 according to the index from Shengenvisainfo. She received high marks for her popularity, beaches, cuisine, friendliness of the locals and good weather.
The best food on board
Experts from the British online price comparison aggregator MoneySuperMarket analyzed 27 thousand passenger reviews from more than 100 airlines and identified carriers with the best on-board meals. Let’s list those airlines from the top 20 rating that are represented on the Russian market:
1. Kuwait Airways.
2. Oman Air.
8. Turkish Airlines.
12. Belavia.
14. Qatar Airways.
15. Emirates Air.
18. Etihad Airways.
19. Ethiopian Airlines.
Invitation to partnership – t.me/snn1964
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Источник: argumenti.ru