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A few additional advanced airfare strategies can help you save money under the right circumstances.
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Letting low fares determine where you go
Airfare pricing is very dynamic. As airlines fight each other for customers, ticket prices can go up and down dramatically. Destinations get enormously less expensive in the off-season and much more expensive during peak travel periods.
The ultimate way to save money on your airplane ticket is to let bargain airfares determine where you go; rather than choosing where to go, and then looking for the best fares.
- Rather than locking yourself into a single destination, and looking for the best fares, you can take advantage of whatever bargains exist for your travel dates. Several tools can help you find lower-than normal fares. Find a Cheap Fare to SOMEWHERE.
- In the most extreme cases, airlines and travel sites occasionally make errors that result in extremely inexpensive “mistake fares”. If you can jump on these fares before they correct them, you can travel for pennies on the dollar. Lua error in Module:Link at line 366: attempt to index field '?' (a nil value)..
Other tips
- If you live near the Canadian border, taking a flight from a nearby Canadian airport can save a bundle of money. Because of the current exchange rates and the different competitive pressures from low-priced airlines, flights from Canada can be significantly cheaper than flights from the United States. Canada also has different holidays. So, flights to popular vacation spots, over US-only holidays like President’s Day, stay relatively affordable.
- If you think you might need to take advantage of their extended cancellation benefits, you can book through Priceline. Priceline doesn't just offer "opaque" airfares and hotels, you can also use them like any other regular booking site. With any domestic airline, you normally get 24 hours to cancel your ticket (or a free 24-hour holding period), as long as it is at least 7 days until your flight. With Priceline, you can cancel until 11:29pm EST on the next business day after purchasing your ticket, regardless of the 7-day limit. This gives you valuable extra time to make changes.
- You can occasionally save some money on your airline tickets by buying a travel package. Travel sites often like to tout the benefits of booking “air and hotel” packages. However, in our experience, under normal circumstances, there aren’t significant savings to be found. Often, you’ll get a better deal by booking your hotel separately. However, when hotel prices are high or you are travelling to a major beach vacation spot, packages can save you money. They are also often a great way to save on the price of business and first-class tickets. Lower the Cost of an Expensive Airline Ticket by Buying a Travel Package.
- Optimize extra rewards you receive when you buy a ticket. Even novice travelers should be earning frequent flyer miles from their tickets plus credit card points for making the airfare purchase. However, it is possible to receive even more rewards when you purchase a ticket. You can take advantage of a travel site’s loyalty program (along with the airline’s), sometimes earn cash-back by buying your tickets through a travel portal, and/or sometimes save money by using discounted gift cards. Each of these options takes extra effort but lower the effective cost of purchasing a ticket.
For example, nonstop tickets between Vancouver and Honolulu, during President’s week, were $513, while leaving from Seattle would have cost $846 nonstop or $775 for the cheapest tickets. Tickets between Toronto and Cancun were $380, while a comparable trip from Buffalo was $880.
Expert strategies
Some additional expert strategies provide other opportunities to get fly for less money.
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