Hotel quarantine is an expensive business when going to Australia. You are required to spend two weeks locked into a hotel room, and to add insult to injury, you also have to pay a quarantine fee. The cost for a single traveller in many states is AU$3,000 (US$2,300, £1,660, €1,930).
Those arriving into Queensland pay slightly less, and Western Australia is cheapest at A$2,520. With additional adults being charged A$1,000 and children at A$500 a piece, it ends up being a huge amount of money for families, even with smaller children being free. There are two ways to get a fee exemption, which is important to know.
Travel Booking Date
If your flights were booked before the introduction of the fees, you do not have to pay the quarantine fee. The date depends on the state you’re arriving into. For example, those arriving into Victoria would need to have booked airline tickets before 10 July 2020.
Financial Hardship and Payment Plans
You can also get a fee exemption if you can demonstrate financial hardship. Just what would constitute this is not explicitly stated on the Government web sites, but it does ask for proof of this.
The one light at the end of the tunnel is that you can request to go on a payment plan for the debt. That should ease the burden for people and is the least they can do.
Applying for an Exemption
The various states that allow exemptions have web forms or e-mail addresses available for this. For South Australia, there is an online form you need to complete. In my case, I completed this as soon as I received my invoice in the post.
Overall Thoughts
There probably won’t be too many people remaining who booked before June or July 2020, though some may be still moving their flight dates therefore be eligible. Either way, it’s good to know this is possible for those who did buy tickets before the introduction of fees.
It is a shame the quarantine fees, rules and exemptions are not harmonised throughout the country. Your arrival city determines the fee, the age of the small children that don’t attract a fee, and various other things. Therefore, you will need to check the state government web site specific to you before travelling.
What do you think of the fee exemptions for hotel quarantine in Australia? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
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Hi, I have shown proof of booking and date in March 2020 and flight May 2020 and received this in reply
“Thank you for your application. However we still need some documentation, could you please provide cancellation details from the airline.”
Which I don’t have,I thought the booking was enough…any advice ?
Did quarantine in South Australia
I did my quarantine in South Australia as well. I just sent them a copy of my Qatar Airways e-ticket which shows the date of booking on it, and they sent over a credit note. It doesn’t say anything in the rules that requires more evidence.
The website here – https://www.covid-19.sa.gov.au/restrictions-and-responsibilities/international-arrivals – literally says, “Quarantine fees apply to all international passengers. They do not apply to travellers who purchased tickets before 12.00 pm ACST on 13 July 2020.”
The FAQ PDF says “Travellers who purchased flights before 12.00pm 13 July 2020 ACST will be excluded from quarantine fees. Evidence needs to be supplied and these travellers are still required to quarantine in government-arranged accommodation.”
Therefore, I’m quite surprised you’re being asked for more evidence than the date of purchase of your ticket. I’m not sure what you should do about that. Perhaps send over a copy of your card statement/bank statement showing the flight purchase date. Not sure what else you can do, as the website certainly does not state anything about proof of cancellation from the airline.
I booked my one way BA flights with avios in June 2020 to travel to Sydney in May 2021. BA has cancelled all flights to AU till earliest Nov 2021. If by miracle (!), BA would re-route me on another airline to Sydney, will the hotel quarantine payment exemption apply to me – as I originally booked the flights in June 2020? I suspect not if BA re-booked the flights at a later date?
I believe the exemption would apply. My original flights were booked in February 2020 and the dates were changed by me once and by Qatar Airways due to border closures and other reasons several more times.
As long as you have your originally booked ticket with the same booking reference/PNR, your original booking date would stand, I would think, even if you were re-routed. Keep your original e-ticket.
I can only envisage it not working out if you received an entirely new ticket with a new booking reference/PNR, as that would be valid commencing when you get it. However, on a re-route, it’s usually on the original ticket.
I also think BA will re-route you, because whether it’s Avios or a cash ticket, it’s still a ticket and they’re still obliged to get you where you need to go. Let me know how you get on.
Many thanks for your quick reply. Yes, I still have the original booking email from BA. Am waiting to see what the UK government will announce in terms of lifting travel restrictions on 12th April – if any. Then I will call BA to see if they are willing to re-route. I don’t want a FTV as I need to return to Australia this year.
I note that you mentioned that quarantine costs are not the same for Australia. But I guess I will take whatever BA can do for me. Once am back in Australia, I can get to Sydney with QF from other cities. The main thing is to be back in Australia!
Oh no worries on the reply, I’m always happy to help. Yes, see what the UK government does, of course. I know if you try to book a flight from LHR to SYD with BA right now, the offer you get on the BA web site is with Qatar Airways via Doha, so my guess is that is how they would re-route you. My advice would be to take the attitude that you know you’re going to be re-routed, so how will they be doing that, as opposed to asking to be re-routed.
Just avoid PER if you can, try to get into the other cities as they are the ones that offer the quarantine waiver. I did the same, I managed to get a flight to ADL and then booked a QF flight with Avios for ADL-SYD after quarantine finished. That being said, BA should re-route to the final destination, so you shouldn’t have to worry about that yourself.
The 14 days quarantine, by the way, does not count the day you check in or the day you check out. It’s arrival day followed by 14 entire days in quarantine, and you check out of the hotel the day after that. Just in case you need to know that!
Again, thanks for your very helpful reply to a fellow Aussie 🙂
Good to know if I try to book LHR – SYD now with BA, they would show QR flights. I read that BA has refused to re-route people on QR claiming they do not have code share or something like that. Your advice is great, when I call BA I will say that how will they re-route me – instead of asking them to re-route.
It is also good that you mentioned avoid PER as we have friends who said if we could find flights to PER then take them. To be honest, I would prefer to fly into SYD (home) if possible, if not then ADL (as QR has got Qsuites!).
Oh dear, the 14 days quarantine does not include the checkin and checkout days – this means extra 2 days in “prison” 🙁
Yeah I was checking recently and noticed the QR flights on the BA website for Sydney, but only out of LHR. When I tried for DUB, it gave me a different routing altogether, via HKG with CX.
I didn’t know about the extra days either. I was lucky I arrived at like 7:30pm, so it was only 4.5 hours of that initial day and of course on leaving day I was out the door at 8am, so it’s not really two whole days, depending on your arrival time. Nobody is going to be hanging out in the quarantine hotel any longer than they have to on leaving day!! Anyway, good luck with it – I hope you manage to get there!
I made a huge blunder – checked my booking date again and it was not in June 2020, but October 2020 (when BA had 50% discount on avios booking) – arrrgh! So, no quarantine fee exemption possible – have to cough up the $ mercilessly.
Only consolation is that today some Australian news advocate for home quarantine (now with the vaccine) instead of prison hotel quarantine. So, maybe I can ask BA to re-route for flights in September / October when by that time most Australians will (hopefully) be vaccinated. I know re-routing flights have to be taken within 12 months of booking – which should not be a problem for us.
I have also read your blogs on food in Pullman hotel quarantine in Adelaide last Christmas – very interesting. I think I could eat the food as well – not the horrible ones posted by some in the news. Maybe quarantine hotels in Adelaide are better than the ones in Sydney.
Yes, that’s the thing, the situation could change rapidly. For example, if you have been vaccinated, why is there a need to quarantine? No doubt more will come to light as time passes. It’s really best to do nothing until closer to your travel date as who knows what will happen between now and then.
Adelaide is good as there are hardly any international flights there, I think only Qatar and Air New Zealand when I was checking. I really lucked out with the Pullman Hotel, considering it’s five star and I got a balcony room. I have seen some awful food at other hotels and heard some much worse experiences than mine, that’s for sure!!