Since my closest friend in the world is moving away, see http://www.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/004710.html
for details,
I will be interested in obtaining cheap airfare to NC. Problem is, I’ve only ever flown once, I have no experience with airlines, and I don’t know how reliable some of the on-line services are.
Here’s what I’m looking for: Some reliable (tried and true) websites that will give me airline quotes.
Also, for you flight veterans out there, is $238 round trip from Syracuse, NY to Charlotte, NC cheap? It sounds pretty cheap to me, so maybe I need look no further (this is on US AIR)
Thanks for any help,
Suzette
Love is like popsicles…you get too much you get too high.
Preview Travel is where I book a lot of my flights. Or you can book travel on Yahoo! You can also try the individual airlines’ websites. I recommend staying away from Priceline.com though. You can get shafted very easily using them.
Preview Travel is usually pretty good. $238 sounds relatively decent to me. Southest Airlines www.iflyswa.com is usually the King of Cheap but they only fly to certain airports/states and don’t have much in the way of amenities (don’t expect any peanuts and pop!).
Typically, I’ll call a Travel Agent, get their number and then check on-line to try and find something cheaper. It usually ends up being that the on-line is cheaper 50% of the time.
www.lowestfare.com is how I went – and they did, indeed, have the lowest fares I found on-line.
If you have the time, a friend recommended to me that you find the lowest fare you can on lowestfare.com; then go to priceline.com and make a bid for the same flight at $50-75 less. Often on priceline you can go a little deeper on your price cut if you fill out like a credit card app or something. (The credit card co. will add $50 to your bid.)
“You should tell the truth, expose the lies and live in the moment.” - Bill Hicks
Yeah, but watch out for that credit card deal on Priceline. When I tried that, they sent me a credit card with only a $500 limit and an annual fee … except that the thing they sent in the mail along with the card didn’t mention there was an annual fee. Fortunately I thought to call them up and ask before allowing them to activate it but I bet they trap a lot of people that way.
Also if you’re buying international tickets through Priceline they might add up to $100 in tax.
I second the Cheap Tickets recommendation. But you should always shop around. A few months ago I tried every online agency I could find for a roundtrip between Dublin and Glasgow, and ended up getting the cheapest deal just by booking directly from the airline’s website (this is rare, but does happen).
BTW if anyone knows of any spring specials between San Francisco and London …
Here’s my deal on Priceline.com. It sucks and I hate it. Yeah, maybe you can get a really good price, but make sure you can be flexable with the times, and make sure you can definately go at that time before booking anything. Here’s why:
I wanted to surprise my ex-boyfriend with a flight out to visit him at his school in Connecticut. 200 dollars for a round-trip sounds great, only due to no flexability I ended up only being able to spend one day. I’ll recap: one day for 200 dollars to see my boyfriend at the time. Well, jerk didn’t know if he could have me out there, even though the tickets were non-refundable and non-transferrable. About a week after I bought these tickets, I broke up with him. So now, I have a round-trip ticket to Connecticut that I have no reason to use. Money wasted.
Maybe I should have saved this one for the BBQ Pit, but it seemed fitting…
The best things in life are Italian…that’s the thing, though…I’m not Italian.
If you want to hook up into the mainframe of all the airlines it is, www.itn.com
There, you can find the lowest fare for any flight anywhere on any airline. It’s the mainframe network computer they all use. I find the cheap flight there, call the airline & presto! Perfect.
Apparently it’s operated by Sabre, the airlines’ booking-and-schedule company. They quoted me Toronto to Helsinki USD 1089 return on a variety of airlines, with one stop. Is that reasonable?
Both Travelocity and Expedia have great email notification services. Tell them what flights you’re interested in and they will send you alerts when a special fare is available.
Travelocity will let you know every time the best price changes.
Expedia just mails you every week or so with the best deal.
I use them both and have seen lots of $98 fares for U.S. travel, so you may be able to find something really cheap. I also have Expedia sending me PHL-London fares every week and have seen those go under $300 from time to time.
There’s also bestfares.com, but that’s best for more open-ended travel between major cities, not always specific routes.
Yes, Sunspace, I use travelocity all the time. I also use expedia. I used to double check with my travel agent and both travelocity and expedia were not only consistently correct, but consistently cheaper for the same flights because sometimes the agents tack on a fee, and sometimes they just don’t give you the cheapest rate available.
I would recommend checking both sites against each other though, as sometimes I’ve found flights on one that weren’t listed on the other. For instance, I got a flight to Canada for $400.00 from expedia, and the best I could find anywhere else was $600-$800.
I can’t remember if it was expedia or travelocity (I think it was expedia), that doesn’t require you to give them your credit card information on line in order to actually book online. They have an 800 number you can call and give them your card number on the phone and they’ll give you a 4 digit code to enter in place of your card number which will automatically recognize that they have your number on file and bill it to you accordingly. I think that’s a much safer way to go.
Also, both sites compare all the airlines that go between your origin and destination cities so you don’t have to check each airline individually. The only thing you have to do is keep going back and changing your departure and arrival times to get a feel for what TIME it’s cheaper to travel as well as which airlines are cheapest.
BUT… one other thing to keep in mind. You can use one of those sites to check the best fares, find the airline and flights you want to book, and then go to that airline’s site to check and see if they have any special frequent flyer bonuses for booking through THEIR online site. If they do, choose the flight you found on the other site and book it directly through the airline. I did that when I went to Dallas last summer to visit Grace. I used travelocity and expedia to determine the best dates, times and airline, which in that case turned out to be American. I then went to the American site and learned I could get 5,000 extra miles just for using the their site to book my ticket!
united.com ? united airlines site has excellent flight info. If you want to know if a plane is ontime, just input a flight number, itll give you how many minutes the flight is late or early. nice. But then if you watch carefully, youll see that they get their info on that from itn.com …
Well, they TELL you that the tickets are nonrefundable! (and not in fine print, either) Sorry but I can’t see saying that an agency “sucks” for selling you a nonrefundable ticket, that you were told was nonrefundable before you bought it, just because your plans changed.
Besides, it’s not just Priceline. Tickets purchased through consolidators are frequently nonrefundable - and if they’re not they’ll usually cost you more.
Back (sort of) to the OP, I got my London tickets today from a travel agency down the road - $100 cheaper than I could find them on any online site.
