Cebu Pacific permanently removes change fees, but fare difference still applies

Cebu Pacific is no longer charging passengers a “change fee” when they rebook their flights for another date.

CEB’s permanent removal of the change fee is effective immediately and allows passengers to rebook as many times as they need.

The carrier used to charge regular rebooking fees of P1,500 for domestic, P1,300 for international short haul, P2,800 for international long haul. In 2018, it offered a Flexi ticket option that cut the fees by 60 pecent. It’s standard airline practice that the cheaper the ticket, the higher the rebooking fee, and vice versa.

“In a recent survey we conducted, flexibility remains one of the considerations of our passengers when deciding to travel again. Because of this, we are removing our change fee effective immediately. As we work on rebuilding our network and supporting domestic tourism, we will continue to listen to our passengers so we can make it even more convenient for ‘everyjuan’ to fly again,” said Candice Iyog, CEB vice president for marketing and customer experience.

The carrier added that passengers having flexibility in their travel plans and tickets is critical to restoring confidence in air travel.

It should be noted that change fee is different from fare difference, which stil applies. As with all airlines, if passengers book a low-priced ticket and they want to change their travel dates, and the price has gone up in the interim, they will have to pay the price difference.

An example would be if you bought your ticket during a seat sale and your new dates don’t offer the same promo. Then the passenger pays the difference between the two fares. Ticket prices usually depend on the whether it’s low season or peak season. Since last year, however, as domestic travel was shut down completely for months and is just recovering now, traditional peak months (like summer) are nowhere near pre-pandemic levels.