HOW TO AVoiD holiDAY trAVel blues · if possible, try to book airfare and hotels together. The pack-age deals often result in signifi cant price reductions than if you were to purchase

HOW TO

AVoiD holiDAY trAVel blues

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+ MoneY sAVing tips

About this book

bAsics tips to booking cheAper Flights onlineThe Basics

advanced Tips

breAking Down Airline booking websitesaggregaTors

Booking engines

Major airlines

airline Fare WaTch siTes

inTernaTional airFare

in conclusion

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INSIDE

intro

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About this BookThe airline industry is notorious for going out of its way

to price discriminate, hike fares, and try to get as much

money out of you as possible. prices fl uctuate wildly all

the time. however, if you’re a smart shopper and know

where to look, you can fi nd cheap fl ights and avoid be-

ing taken advantage of by the dizzying price structures

and fl uctuations that take place in this industry.

There is no shortage of travel websites out there, and

many have redundant searches. at the same time, many

sites provide different results. The guide here is an effort

to cover a large cross-section of available fl ights so you

can get the best price without having to search 100

different websites. The advice here is based on our own

experiences as well as feedback from people like you.

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The reality is, there is no one “best” website for booking a fl ight. sometimes the cheapest fl ight will be found on a website that browses hundreds of different airlines, and sometimes the fl ight will be found on the airline websites themselves as “unpublished” deals that are only available to the people who book directly on the website. Be prepared and willing to check out a few websites to ensure you get the cheapest airfare.

if your travel dates are fl exible be sure to check the box that says “fl exible dates”. The difference between days can sometimes result in saving hundreds of dollars. some sites will actually offer a view of the surrounding days so that you can compare prices. Be sure to take advantage of this ability.

if you aren’t afraid of staying up late or waking up early then look for fl ights that depart in early morning hours or late night hours. These fl ights are usually less full due to their inconvenient departure times which means airlines will sometimes put discount rates on those fares.

if you fi nd a fl ight you want on a booking engine (orbitz/Travelocity), you can check to see if the same exact fl ight is offered on the airline’s own website (usually ~ $6 less).

check airfare prices from the three nearest airports. Most sites have an option to let you check nearby airports - differ-ent airport combinations can yield very different prices.

check different days and times. if your travel dates are fl exible, check out orbitz fl ight matrix to see what days have the best deals. once you know which dates are cheaper, try those same day combinations on the other sites.

it’s a good idea to check airfares often (up to 3 times per day) because prices fl uctuate all the time.

if possible, try to book airfare and hotels together. The pack-age deals often result in signifi cant price reductions than if you were to purchase the two items separately. Many major sites that sell airfare have expanded to offer hotel packages as well.

bAsic tips

This section of the book is fi lled with tips and tricks that people searching for fl ights online can use to help secure the cheapest fl ights possible. Although some of these tips are based on specu-lation, they are speculations that are widely accepted by industry experts. Some tips may work bet-ter for some people than others based on your destinations, ori-gin, fl exibility, and your budget, so be sure to decide whether or not a certain method is right for you. The tips are divided up be-tween the basic tips that some of you may already be familiar with to the advanced tips that very few casual shoppers realize exist. We hope you can fi nd something here to help you this holiday season!

Booking Cheaper Flights Online

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03

keep in mind airport parking fees and tolls, which can really add up over a number of days. Use satellite parking when available - it tends to be cheaper. When deciding between airports, keep in mind the cost of gas - and or public transportation / taxi fares.

some airlines will allow you to change your fl ight for around $50-100 to a different day if they have availability. so if you want to stay an extra day in new York city, it might only cost you $50 to extend your trip. call the airline and talk to a cus-tomer service rep – they can often be rather accommodating.

if you fl y often, sign up for frequent fl yer miles with each airline. even if you book through a booking engine (like orbitz), you can still apply miles to that particular airline's frequent fl yer account. You might also want to look into getting a credit card (like the delta skymiles american express card) that earn points when you shop - many have double points for things you buy everyday. Those points tend to add up after a while and can be used to get free fl ights.

if you're a student, check out student Universe or sTa Travel for discounted airfare.

When considering the time of day to book your fl ight, mornings can sometimes be better. The reality is, though, that airlines vary their prices according to demand and also in response to what their competitors are doing so time of day may not always be a factor. in the early morning though, some airline may not have adjusted fl ight price increases in response to their competitors yet.

Booking is often busier right after payday, so it might be better to book after the 7th of the month.

airlines often offer sales that only appear on their websites and won’t show up in airfare search engines so be aware of this reality and, if you can, check as many airline websites as well.

some low fare airlines do not even share their fares with air-fare search engine sites so be sure to seek those out as well.

Whatever you do, don’t forget about the extra fees! Baggage fees are a reality on almost every single airline, so be sure to take those into consideration when booking your fl ight. some airlines have gone as far as to charge for both checked baggage and your carry-on.

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Basic Tips (continued)

it’s A gooD iDeA to check AirFAres oFten (up to 3 tiMes per DAY) becAuse prices FluctuAte All the tiMe.

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04

airlines can only change their prices up to three times per busi-ness day and only once on saturdays and sundays. This creates two potential tips for people looking to fi nd great airfare.

First – as mentioned before, be sure to search up to two to three times per day in anticipation of these changes. price fl uctuation between these changes can literally be hundreds of dollars.

second – sometimes the best deals can be found on saturday morning. since there is only one fare change on saturdays (and it usually happens in the afternoon) some airlines will attempt to signifi cantly undercut the competition on the last fare change on Friday evening with a signifi cantly lower fare. This would allow that airline to capture a majority of the sales almost all day saturday before the competition can respond. The Friday evening fare change might not refresh on the major sites until as late as 3am on saturday morning, making breakfast time on saturday a great time to catch a great fare.

Be sure to clear your cookies when searching for airfares online. if you fi nd a fare you like and choose to come back and check it later, some websites will realize you have been there before and keep showing the original price even if that price has dropped since your last visit.

Using one-Way Flights - southwest and jetblue list separate prices for each leg of the fl ight. if you fi nd that one of the legs of the fl ight is way is cheaper than the other, check the more expensive route via orbitz and Travelocity as a one-way fare. This way you can book two separate fl ights using two separate sites and get the best deal on each one-way fl ight. if you do book this way, make sure that each search was run within the last 10-15 minutes and book them close to the same time. You don’t want to take the chance that one reser-vation expires before you get a chance to book them both.

Multiple cities - if you need to book a fl ight to multiple cit-ies, there are several strategies you can take. Most booking engines allow you to search fl ights using a “multi-city” or

ADVAnceD tipsBooking Cheaper Flights Online

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cleArYourcookies

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“3-way” option. You should try this fi rst to get a baseline of prices. it’s also a good idea to break up the fl ight and run searches for one-way fl ights for each leg. jetblue and south-west treat all their fl ights as one-ways (even if you’re book-ing round trip), so they often have good prices for one-way tickets. orbitz also tends to return cheap one-way fl ights.

Tuesday is, statistically, the least traveled day of the week. This might change on a week like Thanksgiving week when people are fl ying in for the holiday, but on many weeks Tues-day is a great day to fl y for low pricing. so if you can, search for fl ights departing and/or arriving on Tuesdays you might fi nd a bargain price simply based on the fact that the plane isn’t very full. Wednesdays and saturdays come up second and third on average as the least traveled days of the week.

saturdays and Wednesday mornings are often good time to check airfare prices. The airlines tend to release new fares around these times allowing the “early bird to catch the worm” before prices begin to increase due to demand.

saturday mornings are also a good time to fi nd “blooper prices” which are errors by the airlines, which sometimes result in really cheap airfare. don’t get too excited though, it doesn’t happen very often.

When booking international fl ights that involve one stop or more, consider the tax rates of the countries in which the layovers will take place. if these rates are high they can signifi -cantly increase your fi nal ticket price. consider re-routing your trip through another country to save big on expensive taxes.

if you book a round trip ticket with an airline and do not make your fi rst fl ight, you need to notify them if you intend to use the second half of the fl ight. otherwise, they will cancel your entire ticket.

in the U.s. it is required by law that an airline ask for volun-teers to be “bumped” from an overbooked fl ight before that airline can remove anyone from the fl ight. These volunteers are often compensated with free fl ights or cash back. if you are fl exible in your departure and arrival time and your current fl ight is overbooked, consider hanging out at the airport a little longer than expected.

Advanced Tips (continued)

06

tuesDAY is, stAtisticAllY, the leAst trAVeleD DAY oF the week. weDnesDAYs & sAturDAYs Are seconD AnD thirD.

the AggregAtorsWebsites that fall into the “aggregators” category all perform a similar function. They gather airfare data from numerous resources around the web and display them to you according to what you are looking for. aggrega-tors are a good place to find and compare flight costs for multiple airlines. Most airlines will provide their fare data to aggregators but some do withhold special deals, so while these sites are great places to get a good idea of a potential flight cost, there might be a cheaper op-tion out there that will take some digging. aggregators simply link to other sites where you can purchase your flights and do not offer reservations themselves.

Kayak.com – kayak is one of the most popular aggrega-tor websites out there, and for good reason. kayak does a wonderful job of providing tools to make the search process extremely easy and the site is very user friendly. kayak Tip – While using kayak.com, be sure to take ad-vantage of the “show +/- 3 days” feature that is offered and the “show Matrix” feature. Both of these are avail-able after you have begun your initial search and the buttons to access these features appear in the top right hand corner of the search results. This is a great way to catch super cheap travel days for your specific route.

Yahoo Farechase – visit travel.yahoo.com for Yahoo’s version of an airfare search engine. although not quite as flexible as the kayak website the Yahoo Farechase program does a good job narrowing down your search based on your needs. There were multiple occasions where Yahoo Farechase turned up the cheapest flights.

Farecast – Farecast is the Bing airfare search engine and can be found at bing.com/travel. Farecast is a fare prediction engine which does not always provide 100% accurate results, but having the power of the Bing search engine behind it certainly doesn’t hurt this program. like Yahoo Farechase, Farecast does lack some of the flexibility of kayak.com, but what it lacks in flexibility it makes up for in ease of mind. The “price predictor” feature Farecast offers tells you when it is time to Buy or when you should hold out a little longer. They “price predictor” appears at the top of your search results and if you click it Farecast will provide a detailed breakdown of their analysis. Farecast Tip – if you have a Windows live (hotmail) id then Farecast will allow you to track fares and, if you want, will email you updates on specific route prices on a daily or weekly basis. This is very helpful if you don’t have time to log in every day to check prices or if you are planning travel that is a decent ways away.

booking enginesThe traditional booking engines act as travel agents and allow you to book your flights, hotels, and sometimes car rentals through their website without having to visit a third party site. some of these sites will offer extended service beyond simply searching for the cheapest flight including concierge service and sometimes money back price guarantees. These sites are also the most popular sites as many of them have extensive advertising bud-gets and national advertisement campaigns. There are often great deals to be found on these sites but catchy slogans don’t always amount to the cheapest flights.

Orbitz.com – The orbitz website allows its users to book flights, cruises, rental cars, cruises, and much more. it is an all in one vacation center and usually offers competitive prices with a small booking fee. one great feature of orbitz is their price assurance program. on most, if not all flights, if someone books the same flight as you for a cheaper price then orbitz will mail you a check for the difference. This ensures you always get the cheapest price they offer. Be sure to check on their site exactly which flights and packages this pertains to.

booking sites

There are literally hundreds of websites on the web today dedicated to helping you find flights to destinations around the world. Some of these you may have heard of, but many will be unfamiliar to you. This next section of our guide is going to break down the different types of airfare websites and talk about some of the best options for your airfare search needs.

Breaking Down Airline Booking Websites

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Priceline.com – priceline is famous for their commer-cials featuring spokesperson William shatner. When purchasing airfare priceline should definitely be on your checklist as they often produce great deals, especially when packaging flights with hotels and/or car rentals. priceline also offers a “name Your own price” feature on their website where you can bid a certain amount for a flight, hotel, or rental car and companies in the area will accept your bid if they are interested. This can often lead to significant savings but be sure to read the fine print; you are stuck with whatever they give you!

Travelocity.com – Travelocity is similar in design to or-bitz and priceline and, like the others, offers bookings on flights, hotels, cruises, car rentals, trains, and even tours and attraction tickets. Famous for their “Travel-ing gnome” commercials, Travelocity is also a major player in the airfare game and should be checked when searching for flights.

Expedia.com – expedia is another big time player in the industry and offers a “Best price guarantee”. They guarantee that you are getting the best price, and if you find a better price on the same trip within 24 hours of booking they will refund the difference plus give you a $50 travel coupon. not a bad deal at all!

Cheaptickets.com - cheapTickets is another good booking engine that tends to focus more on flights than anything else. Their site can me somewhat frustrating to use at times but it may still produce the cheapest results. They have a good flexible search feature that allows you to search around your potential departure and return dates enabling you to spot cheaper days to fly. They are a smaller site than the other contenders in this category and tend to display results for less airlines than the others.

MAjor Airlinesif you are really interested in booking the cheapest flight possible, you’ve also got to consider checking out the websites that are owned and operated by the airlines themselves. Many major airlines and some discount airlines offer “website only” specials and discounts that are not available from any other outlets. one large airline won’t even list their prices with ag-gregators and booking engines and we’ll tell you more about that below.

Site-Only Sales - some airlines that often feature sit-only specials are jet Blue airways (jetblue.com), delta

airlines (delta.com), and U.s. airways (usairways.com). sometimes these specials offer just a few dollars off but they can sometime save you hundreds of dollars if you are lucky enough to find a discount on your desired route.

Southwest Airlines – southwest airlines does not release any of their prices to the sites listed above and their fares can usually only be purchased at southwest.com. it is definitely worth your while to take a quick peek at their site as southwest is known for great deals and high quality customer service.

Airline FAre wAtch sitesa somewhat new site type has hit the scene over the last decade. airfare watch sites monitor countless web-sites (including major airline sites and many of the sites listed above) and then relay their findings to their users.

AirfareWatchdog.com – airfare Watchdog is the cur-rent industry leader in airfare watch sites and provides a quality service to their customers. if you search for flights through airfare Watchdog you will end up visit-ing many of the sites above and there won’t be any dif-ference in price. The quality of airfare Watchdog comes from its email notifications. air-are Watchdog can send notifications on specific route prices or all prices from a given origin. They simply report the lowest prices found during that given time period and then tell you which site the deal was on. This can end up saving you lots of time as, in essence, they are searching all these differ-ent sites for you! Be sure to check them out and see how you like their service.

internAtionAl AirFArealthough many of the sites above do cater to people searching for international flights there are also a few that are specifically built for international flight search-es. it is suggested to check the sites listed above but in addition add the following to your list: dohop.com, Mobissimo.com, and skyscanner.com. all three of these sites performed fairly well in our limited searches and it appears as if they each have certain strengths and weaknesses that result in considerable variations in air-fare between certain countries. as always, if you’ve got the time, these sites are definitely worth a quick search.

Booking Sites (continued)

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hAppYholiDAYs!

In ConclusionThere is no one-way to fi nd cheap airfare

online, but by following some of the steps in

this guide you are sure to have an easier time

hunting down those discount fares this holiday

season. We hope you enjoyed our tips and

suggestions and we encourage you to pass this

guide along to your friends and family.

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hAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYhAppYThis guide was brought to you by AirportExplorer.com