If you'll be traveling by air, you can get the best deals by staying at least 7 days, including a Saturday night stayover, and leaving and returning on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. A single day's difference can mean big savings.
You can find out the optimum dates for your time window by using the search form at Travelocity. Choose the 'flexible dates' option, then look at the 'Latest Travel' date listed next to each airline. Your goal will be to keep your departure and return dates as close to the Latest Travel date as possible. This will help you get the best price.
You can score cash or a free ticket
for future travel, if you keep your plans flexible.
Airlines overbook and that means that you could volunteer
to get "bumped":
Bumping
- Traveler's Resource Center
Now you know the best dates and times for your travel. Your departure and arrival airports can make a big difference in price, too. The savings are often worth an extra hour or two of driving. Many of the .
Now you're ready to check for the lowest fares. The companies listed below use a number of different ways to bring you the lowest fares. Some are consolidators, also known as bucket shops. They buy tickets in bulk at wholesale prices.
Others work with numerous partners, letting competition
do the work. Still others keep an eye on the airlines
every move, letting their visitors in on money-saving
scoops. Regardless of how they do it, these sites offer
some of the cheapest fares on the Web:
BestFares.com
Cheap Seats
Travel
HotWire
Flights.com
LastMinuteTravel.com
OneTravel.com
Smarter
Living
Travelocity
TripSpot.com
Yahoo Farechase
For international travel, try Economy
Travel.
Fare searches typically
check the major airlines only. There are lots
of other airlines out there!
Popular budget airlines:
Airline
Websites - Independent Traveler
Here's a quick
way to find which European budget carrier you need.
If you have a fair amount of flexibility, try AirHitch
for travel to and from Europe, Hawaii & the Caribbean.
Are you interested in international
destinations? Are you close to an international gateway
airport, or can you get there cheaply? Then you might
consider becoming a freelance air courier. You can pull
off some hefty savings this way and may, with some luck,
get to fly free! It's all in the articles below:
The
5 Biggest Myths About Air Courier Travel - Intrepid
Traveler
Courier
FAQ - The Los Angeles Times
Courier
Services - JobMonkey.com
If convenience is important, others can do most of
the work for you, but you'll have to pay some sort of
fee:
Key To The
Airways is a guide to consolidator and courier flights.
It's received courier praise as the most complete list
available. They also offer a lowest published courier
airfare guarantee.
The
IAATC (The International Association Of Air Travel Couriers)
offers a Members Only website with regularly updated
courier company lists, schedules and fares. The IAATC
is the oldest courier association.
The ACA
(Air Courier Association) offers similar benefits,
as well access to other bargain fares. They've been
recommended by a Frommer's article.
Courier Travel
gives non-members access to their courier fare search
engine. The best deals are standby flights, which
have a grey background, although these can be hard to
find. Joining Courier Travel will give you access to
all the details. They've been recommended by a New York
Times article.
For those willing to invest
the time, frequent flyer miles can be the ticket to
great airfares. You can earn all the miles you need
without even flying!:
Mileage Workshop
WebFlyer
If you're satisfied
that you've found the lowest fare available, reverse
bidding services are worth a look before you finalize
things. To use the sites below, you make an offer and
see if they accept it. Some flexibility on dates, flight
times and the number of connections could net you big
savings. You must agree in advance to complete the purchase
if they meet your price. Tickets are non-refundable:
Priceline
YouPriceIt
NEXT:
Ground Travel
