Charges for Services at Airports

Act: Aeronautics Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. A-2
Regulation: Air Services Charges Regulations, SOR/85-414, as amended

To Whom Does This Apply?

These Regulations are applied at all airports or air terminals operated by or on behalf of the Minister of Transport, and apply to all aircraft with the following exceptions:  

• state aircraft;
• aircraft owned by the Air Cadet League of Canada;
• sections 4, 5, 9, 10 and 17 do not apply to the landing of an aircraft in distress at an airport other than the airport of the intended destination;
• sections 4, 5, 16 and 17 do not apply to an aircraft participating in a search and rescue operation under the direction of the Canadian Forces Search and Rescue Service;
• section 16 does not apply to any part of an airport held under a lease granted by Her Majesty in right of Canada; and
• section 17 does not apply to an aircraft providing emergency transportation to a person for medical reasons.

The Regulations are not applied at airports which have been transferred by the government and are operated by Airport Authorities. For more information and for a list of these airports, please contact the person below. With few exceptions where an airport is not listed in the Air Services Charges Regulations, it is likely that it is currently operated by an airport authority.  For charges at the airport, please contact the authority directly.

Summary

The Aeronautics Act was passed by the Parliament of Canada in the exercise of its exclusive jurisdiction to make laws with respect to aeronautics. The current revised Act (which was previously divided into the following four parts) is now divided into two parts:

• Part I deals with the control of aeronautics in general;
• Part II, dealing with economic regulatory matters, has since been repealed and was replaced in part by the National Transportation Act which in turn was replaced by the Canada Transportation Act;
• Part III sets out miscellaneous administrative provisions; and
• Part IV -- repealed with the establishment of the Transportation Appeal Tribunal of Canada Act   effective June 30, 2003.

The addition of Part IV, along with several other substantive changes, was made pursuant to An Act to Amend the Aeronautics Act (the "1985 Amendment") enacted on June 28, 1985.

The Air Services Charges Regulations govern the charges for Canadian civil air services provided at airports operated by or on behalf of the Minister of Transport and include:  

• calculation of charges;
• domestic flight landing charges;
• international flight landing charges;
• flying training landing charges;
• general terminal charges;
• aircraft parking charges;
• charge for Emergency Response Services (ERS) outside normal operating hours for ERS; and
• payment of charges.

The actual charges are laid out in the schedules to the Regulations.

DISCLAIMER
Information contained in this section is of a general nature only and is not intended to constitute advice for any specific fact situation. For particular questions, the users are invited to contact their lawyer. For additional information, see contact(s) listed below.

Manitoba Contact(s):
See National Contact.

National Contact(s):
Mr. Dan Laprade
Chief, Economic and Financial Assessment Financial Management
Transport Canada
22nd Floor, Tower C
Place de Ville
330 Sparks Street
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0N5
Telephone: (613) 990-3880
Fax: (613) 998-1337
E-mail: lapradd@tc.gc.ca
Web site: http://www.tc.gc.ca/en/menu.htm