Samsø Rederi, the ferry company owned by Samsø municipality, faces a budget gap of up to 650,000 kroner a month as several of its fixed-price diesel agreements expire, DR reported.
Mayor Per Urban Olsen (K) said the company cannot enter a budget year with a 7.2 million kroner deficit. He sees four options: state support, slower sailing, higher ticket prices and fewer departures. "I don't like the last two. It's pest or cholera. It's a really annoying situation," he said.
Minibus driver Ole Kjær Pedersen, waiting at the harbour in Sælvig for the fast ferry Lilleøre from Aarhus, fears fewer passengers. "I'm not happy about it, because it's tourists and the like that we live on. And if prices go up, that's not good. It's not good," he said.
Søren Peter Kjeldahl, director of one of Samsø's largest workplaces with over 100 employees, ships potatoes, onions and red cabbage to mainland supermarkets, with 4,500 truck trailers crossing the southern Kattegat each year. "We risk being dropped as a supplier if the price gets too high," he said.
Olsen also noted that summer tickets on the Jylland ferry were markedly more expensive after the company had to find nearly two million kroner because of new VAT rules. "We could see it immediately in the load factor. Customers disappeared," he said, appealing to the government to fund ferry traffic.
According to the Ministry of Business, Rural Affairs and Transport, a compensation scheme for municipal ferry companies is being prepared.
Earlier coverage
- Samsø Ferry Faces Up to 650,000 Kroner Monthly Fuel Bill (29 Oct 2026)