Ferry fares double for walking passengers on Kattegat routes

Fares for foot passengers travelling with Molslinjen across Kattegat have doubled since January, DR reports. The low-price ticket has risen from 149 kroner to 299 kroner each way on routes between Odden and Aarhus and between Odden and Ebeltoft.

About 56,000 foot passengers travel with Molslinjen on the routes each year. Several passengers have criticised the increase.

Susanne Dam, who lives in Sjællands Odde, often takes the ferry to collect and return her grandchild, who lives in Jutland. A return trip now costs almost 600 kroner.

“It is a lot of money for a pensioner, and for taking a child back and forth to their parents every other weekend. I can no longer do that as flexibly. I cannot afford it,” she said.

Molslinjen said the increase was caused by a change in how the Danish Tax Agency calculates VAT on a particular type of ticket. The new calculation has given the ferry operator an additional bill of several million kroner, which it has passed on to foot passengers.

“It is not something we want, but it is unfortunately a necessary reaction to a very large VAT bill in the double-digit million range that has landed with us,” said Jesper Maack, Molslinjen’s head of press and communications.

The Danish Tax Agency told DR that the change was intended to bring Danish practice into line with case law from the Court of Justice of the European Union. The agency stressed, however, that ferry operators themselves set prices for both foot and driving passengers.

Molslinjen said its new fares are dynamic, meaning passengers can obtain a low-price ticket for 199 kroner if they book well in advance. That is still a 33.6 per cent increase compared with the price before January.

Dam said advance booking was not always possible because a child might suddenly fall ill and need to be collected.

The higher fares have also affected Carsten Borup, who lives in Beder south of Aarhus. His daughter bought a holiday home in Sjællands Odde in 2024 as a regular meeting place for the family.

“It constantly makes me think about whether I can afford to go to the holiday home. I did not have to think about that when the price was 149 kroner each way. Now I have to cut back on family trips,” he said.

Molslinjen’s Kombardo Expressen bus can be a cheaper alternative, but it stops at Sjællands Odde only once a day. Borup also said he could not use the bus because he is not allowed to take his electric bicycle, which he uses to get around the holiday home area.

Cars have not become more expensive. Molslinjen said it needed to keep car fares competitive with the Storebælt bridge.

“We have had very bad experiences with increasing fares for cars. To keep our business afloat, we have to pay attention to our price level compared with the bridge,” Maack said.

A total of 1,362,835 cars travelled on Molslinjen’s Kattegat ferries in 2025. With the new foot passenger fare of 299 kroner, it is actually cheaper to take a fourth passenger in a car than to travel as a foot passenger.

“It is considerably cheaper if you fill a car. It is an unreasonable price increase, and I also think it is too expensive to pay almost 300 kroner to cross by ferry,” Borup said.