Turkish government to increase departure fees 10-fold

The Turkish government has been planning to increase the departure fee for citizens flying to international destinations tenfold. Currently set at 150 liras, the fee is expected to rise to between 1,000 and 1,750 liras.

Friday June 14 2024 11:50 am

Duvar English

One of the key revenue-boosting elements in the tax package to be discussed in the Turkish Parliament after the holiday break will be the more than tenfold increase planned for the departure fees, according to information obtained by online news outlet Ekonomim.

Turkish citizens flying to international destinations are currently required to pay 150 Turkish liras departure fee per person. However, the departure fee is planned to be increased to a range of 1,000 to 1,750 lira.

If the fee is set at 1,000 lira, the increase will be 566 percent; if set at 1,750 lira, the increase will be 1,066 percent.

The economic administration, preparing to remove many exemptions and exceptions in taxes to increase public revenues, had especially debated transaction taxes on stock and cryptocurrency trading. However, Treasury and Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek announced on June 13 that the transaction tax was abandoned.

Therefore an extraordinary increase in overseas departure fees has been prepared as one of the significant revenue-boosting elements of the upcoming tax package.

In 2023, 1.31 billion liras ($40.13M) were collected from departure fees. In the January-April period of 2024, 427 million liras ($13M) revenue was generated.

Some of the revenue is transferred to the Housing Development Administration of Turkey (TOKİ).