The technique of velocity map imaging has been used to determine the dissociation energy of the C6H6+-Ar van der Waals complex. From the change in the ionization energy between the complex and free benzene and the spectroscopic shift of the S-1<--S-0 transition, the dissociation energies in the S-0 and S-1 states of the neutral complex were determined, being 314 +/- 7 and 335 +/- 7 cm(-1) for the S-0 and S-1 states of the neutral complex, respectively, and 486 +/- 5 cm(-1) for the cation ground (D-0) state.