# Yikes !!!



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

I know I'll get a sympathetic ear on TUG, so here I am to fret.

I booked two back-to-back weeks at the Kahana Beach Vacation Club earlier in the week for a long awaited trip back to Hawaii next July. I have on hold three frequent flyer tickets with Delta which would mostly clean out my account. I hadn't bothered to mention it to my husband since he gets so bored with the planning process. 

This morning I check his email (he hates computers) and find out that his band has been approached to play at a music festival in France right in the middle of the same dates. Airfare and lodging would be paid for him. He knew this yesterday but hadn't bothered to mention it to me. Maybe we need to talk more. In all fairness, I go straight from work to my son's bowling on Tuesday which means I am 15 hours away from home and DH also had a busy day yesterday so he dropped my son off at bowling and went back home to finish a couple of projects. After bowling we were talking about roof damage from an April hailstorm because our insurance company is no longer going to cover roof repair in full and we had already talked to them about filing a backdated claim for the April storm.

Anyway, now I'm faced with whether to confirm the Delta ff tickets (which must be done today). Already past the 24 hour period to cancel the Maui exchanges with no penalty, so if we don't go, I'll have to figure out what to do with them. So do I let the ff tickts go when the cheapest tickets I see now are $866 when the trip to France is in the beginning stages of discussion? Another time, a gig in Switzerland seemed like a sure thing for another one of his bands and never happened. Or do I book the tickets and take whatever the penalty is to cancel them if France happens. Guess I need to check Delta's fee for cancelling the tickets if we do it later.

I have to decide today. I would have finalized the tickets yesterday but my boss hasn't signed my vacation request for the two weeks yet.

Sheila


----------



## wackymother (Sep 26, 2012)

Sorry, Sheila, not to overlook your problems....BUT...your son bowls FIFTEEN HOURS away from home? What kind of super-competitive bowling is this?

And, oh yeah, I would ask your husband if he wants to go to France and if his bandmates are planning on going. If he didn't mention it to you, maybe some of the other guys have conflicts and the band won't be going at all.


----------



## Timeshare Von (Sep 26, 2012)

Personally, I would never book anything (timeshare exchanges or airline tickets) unless I was certain that (1) I would get the time off and (2) everyone going is able to go for those dates too.

At this point, you're already invested in the TS exchanges, so I would probably go ahead and book the airline . . . understanding how difficult booking FF tickets are these days (especially on Delta).

If DH can't go, are you willing to make the most of the trip w/o him?


----------



## Paumavista (Sep 26, 2012)

*We can't plan ahead......*

Well I'm commenting as someone who CANNOT plan ahead.  My life has too many unknowns to plan 9 months in advance (and it sounds like yours does too right now).

Even when we cruise or rent a summer beach house (which means coordinating grown children's schedules and airfares we tend to go out 4-5 months in advance at the *very *maximum).  Yes, I'm sure I miss out on some discounts......but I also don't waste alot of time or money on cancelled plans.  

This is also one of the reasons for now that I don't believe timeshares work well for us - planning far in advance can offer a real advantage with timeshares - but when your life/lifestyle/family change it can really mess things up.  (we're foster parents....I never know much in advance how large my family will be for the next trip (how big a place we'll need) - and we need to plan adult trips "between" children...which is VERY hard to calculate)....so I don't make reservations much in advance.......what I DO is have a list of great places to visit - I do lots of research - I KNOW a good deal when I see it & if we're able to we take advantage of some awsome last minute deals.

Good luck with your decision......remember it's a choice of riches....between 2 good things :whoopie: - How Blessed!!!

Judy


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

wackymother said:


> Sorry, Sheila, not to overlook your problems....BUT...your son bowls FIFTEEN HOURS away from home? What kind of super-competitive bowling is this?
> 
> And, oh yeah, I would ask your husband if he wants to go to France and if his bandmates are planning on going. If he didn't mention it to you, maybe some of the other guys have conflicts and the band won't be going at all.



Sorry that my rambling was unclear. I leave home at 5:30 AM to go to work and work until 5 PM. He bowls at 6:30 PM near my work (20 miles from home), so I go straight from one to the other and we get home at 8:30 PM.

My husband and his band friends are dying to go to France. One of them visits France every chance he gets and the others have never been. As long as they can afford to go, they'll be in. With air and lodging paid, they wouldn't have to get paid too much to make the dollars work. The biggest worry I have is that the offer would be withdrawn for some reason. It happens all the time. Events go over budget and cut back on the entertainment.

I did check and there is pretty good Delta ff availability right now to CDG, so if I don't use the miles for Hawaii, I could go there. I'm leaning toward letting the ff tickets to Maui go and hope for a sale if the festival falls through. The last time we went to Hawaii several years ago, my daughter found a great rate out of Atlanta and drove down there to fly. 

Sheila


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

Timeshare Von said:


> If DH can't go, are you willing to make the most of the trip w/o him?



I travel without my husband often for work, but going to Hawaii without him would really torque him off. And I would rather go to France since I've never been. 

Sheila


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

Paumavista said:


> Good luck with your decision......remember it's a choice of riches....between 2 good things :whoopie: - How Blessed!!!



Amen to that. As we age, planning ahead you always wonder if all will be in good health by then.

Guess I need to look into II's cancellation insurance. I'm more familiar with RCI's, though I never typically sign up for it.

Sheila


----------



## Passepartout (Sep 26, 2012)

I sure can't help you decide between two VERY nice choices. Most folks would have a truly hard time deciding. Flip a coin.

We (DW & I) have a hard time scheduling, too. Well, not me so much, as I'm retired and basically the 'house husband, chief cook & bottle washer.' I also do the timeshare planning- at least as far as scheduling. As we all know, you have to take the better ones when they pop up and you don't have a lot of time to discuss it with the spouse. DW, is working, owns her practice, has a busy schedule of being on several boards, is president of and plays in the local symphony.

The way we handle the planning is to get a large 'planning' calendar to hang on a wall. Then the 'fixed dates' like concerts, rehearsals, board meetings, already scheduled vacations and family functions (as well as birthdays, etc) get added, all color coded are put on it. Then as tentative trips, new responsibilities, deadlines (when to buy trip insurance for example) occur, they get put on the calendar. That way, all either of us has to do is consult the calendar before either scheduling a vacation, doctor appt, or whatever to see if there is a conflict.

It does take some commitment to write down these things as they come up, but is easier on the memory to not have to remember what the spouse has already blocked out. And whoever has put in a commitment first has priority if there turns out to be a conflict.

I know what ever you choose will be the best outcome, Sheila. Enjoy, either Hawaii or Europe. Tough decision.

Jim


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

Jim,

We have a lot in common, though I am not nearly as talented as your DW. My spouse is the "house husband, chief cook & bottle washer" and also helps care for the kids at home (which is down to one now) and the grand-dogs, who have moved back to the farm along with my daughter and SIL. He is disinterested in computers and all the finer points of travel, so the planning chores fall to me. He has a calendar at home with all commitments listed. He shares them with me and I put them on my Outlook calendar. When I book a vacation, he blocks it out on his calendar. The stars were aligned this week, however, and I booked the Maui units on Monday and the trip to France came up on Tuesday. Neither of us had updated our calendars yet. Typically, if I have a vacation booked and a band job is offered, we either modify our travel plans (if the money is good and the modification simple) or he uses a substitute. This is just a hobby band that works cheap, so they all have other things going on and the configuration changes with alternates for each of the players.

Thank you all for the discussion. It has made me calmer about the options. I still haven't made any final decision, but I have until mid-night to finalize or release the Delta tickets.     

Sheila


----------



## Talent312 (Sep 26, 2012)

If you value your marriage, there is no choice:
Go to France with your DH and his bandmates.

This situation results from a "failure to communicate."
You both need to work on that.
.


----------



## wackymother (Sep 26, 2012)

sfwilshire said:


> going to Hawaii without him would really torque him off.



This is my new phrase now. Thanks, Sheila!


----------



## x3 skier (Sep 26, 2012)

If it were me, I take any freebies like the trip to France.  

Long time ago, I learned at the Biz School, sunk costs are irrelevant. IOW, what you have spent so far has no relevancy to what you spend next. From a purely $ look, just look at what you will be spending as a family from now on and ignore any previous $/FF spent and see of it is cheaper one way or the other, France or Hawaii. Often people get hung up on having spent something on one plan and feel they HAVE TO finish that course of action when another will be much cheaper going forward than the course previously chosen.

Once you sort that out, then the personal factors can be looked at with the Future $/FF influence as a separate factor.

Cheers


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

wackymother said:


> This is my new phrase now. Thanks, Sheila!




Glad you like it. Learned that from my favorite Electronics teacher back in the 70s. I can still recite the color code and several of the formulas from his acronym memory aids. He also taught me what a BFH was and how to use it.

I miss this fellow a lot. He's in his 80s and I've been trying to find a convenient time to go visit him. He lives an hour or so away now and has two homes in different cities, so he's sort of hard to catch up with. I haven't seen him in years. 

We were working on a transmitter once and a big ball of fire came rolling out of the back door, which we had open. Wish you could "hear" his accent. He said "Goooooooood". I ask why that was good and he replied "now we know what's wrong with it". Guess you had to be there.   

Sheila


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 26, 2012)

*Just for the record ....*

There was never any doubt in my mind that I would go with him to France if it happens. My only angst is that I will let my flights to Hawaii go and the trip to France, which is very early in the discussion phases, will fall through. 

As mentioned, the worst that can happen, I guess, is that it will cost me money I hadn't expected to spend to fly to Hawaii. I've used up my Southwest and United airmiles this year. I don't really fly a lot to accumulate them. I have a Southwest credit card.  

Thanks again for the interesting conversation.  

Sheila


----------



## MuranoJo (Sep 26, 2012)

sfwilshire said:


> I travel without my husband often for work, but going to Hawaii without him would really torque him off. And I would rather go to France since I've never been.
> 
> Sheila





wackymother said:


> This is my new phrase now. Thanks, Sheila!



This is too funny.  My family has used that phrase for ages, 'torque (someone) off,' but I never really knew the history on it.  My interpretation was it meant someone was really heated up about something.

That aside, if you want to go to France and you've never been before, and your DH and his band want to go, I'd probably take the risk and consider the HI plans so far as sunk costs.  (Depends on how much you suspect this will just be another cancelled gig.)

Not often does one get a chance to go to France on some freebies.  You could do HI the next year.


----------



## riverdees05 (Sep 27, 2012)

Be sure to check the details on the II insurance.  IMHO it is not near as good as RCI.


----------



## wackymother (Sep 27, 2012)

sfwilshire said:


> Glad you like it. Learned that from my favorite Electronics teacher back in the 70s. I can still recite the color code and several of the formulas from his acronym memory aids. He also taught me what a BFH was and how to use it.
> 
> I miss this fellow a lot. He's in his 80s and I've been trying to find a convenient time to go visit him. He lives an hour or so away now and has two homes in different cities, so he's sort of hard to catch up with. I haven't seen him in years.
> 
> ...



Sounds like a great guy. My DH started his second career as a HS English teacher about eight years ago. I hope somebody will remember him as fondly as you remember your electronics teacher. I love the fireball story!


----------



## sfwilshire (Sep 27, 2012)

*As expected .....*

The devil is in the details. The official offer came in and the band would have to secure their own airfare from that amount. At current airfare list prices, they could work for zero and maybe even be a bit in the hole. That isn't necessarily a deal breaker to me if my husband could get free airfare, but it might be to some of the others.

The are looking at all the options and banking on the common wisdom that the best airfare deals are around three months out. Do the TUGers agree? Most of my flying is for work and on short notice. I always seem to make bad decisions on the rare times I book airfare for our personal travel. I either wait too long or book too early.

They have a couple of good sources for information on potential ticket discounts. And at least we're all having fun talking about it. I even checked RCI availability and saw some possibilities for the time frame.   

I'll be keeping those two Maui weeks as a backup. Just hope the airfare isn't crazy expensive by the time I know I need to book it.

Sheila


----------



## T_R_Oglodyte (Sep 27, 2012)

sfwilshire said:


> The are looking at all the options and banking on the common wisdom that the best airfare deals are around three months out. Do the TUGers agree? Most of my flying is for work and on short notice. I always seem to make bad decisions on the rare times I book airfare for our personal travel. I either wait too long or book too early.



Two things will drive the airfare pricing - how fast the plane is filling up and what is happening with fuel prices.

The airlines have ticket pricing algorithms that are designed to maximize revenue.  The pricing you see at any given moment are what the airline anticipates will fill up the plane.  The airline doesn't anticipate that they will suddenly have to make large price cuts to fill the plane; if they suspected as much they would lower prices now to fill up that space.  So there isn't any common rule of thumb about what when the best airline deals are. It all depends on what is happening with pricing.

****

Now, there is certainly lots of information out there about getting deals as the departure date gets closer.  That certainly happens, quite frequently.  A couple of months out if there is still remaining space, the airline has a lot of incentive to reduce pricing to fill up the plane.  Hence, fare sales.  But if they've hit their pricing model right they won't be scrambling to fill the plane, and there will be no last-minute fare cuts. Instead those who held off booking waiting for the fare cut will only see the prices get even higher as the departure date nears.  It's a crap shoot.

And it's especially a crap shoot if you are traveling during a peak demand period, as that is when it is most likely the airline will  not have difficulty filling seats.

*****

For myself, I just start tracking prices.  Often I set up a fare watcher alert at site such as Kayak.  Right now I'm tracking some flights for February that are currently coming in a bit over $1200 for two tickets.  Eight weeks ago they were almost $1400.  A few weeks ago they dropped below $1000. I didn't bite and a week later they went up to where they are now, and they've been stable at that level for about three weeks now.  I need to travel during a peak period so I'm not expecting any last minute fare sales; I'll jump as soon as I see something that looks like a good deal; probably if it drops below $1000 I'll get in.


----------



## Talent312 (Sep 27, 2012)

This website tracks airfares for your flights, notifies you of changes, and after you buy, will tell you if you can save $$ from price reductions:

http://www.yapta.com/

It helped me get a $120 credit from changes in a JetBlue domestic fare.


----------



## sfwilshire (Oct 25, 2012)

Back to report that, as I feared, negotiations broke down and the band is not going to France in 2013. As soon as I found out, I tried to get our original Delta frequent flyer tickets to Maui back. Got the same outbound flight, but the return had gone up to a higher points category. I booked an overpriced points Marriott night at a Courtyard (my least favorite Marriott brand) and will fly home a day later than originally planned. No great harm done.

The guys are disappointed, but they are going to try to book the festival and a few other venues for 2014. I'm just glad we had Maui to "fall back on".

I'm also happy that the trip to France didn't come up a day earlier when I could have cancelled the Maui exchanges with no penalty. They would have been gone forever, for sure.

Thanks for all the conversation and advice.

Sheila


----------



## ronparise (Oct 25, 2012)

sfwilshire said:


> Back to report that, as I feared, negotiations broke down and the band is not going to France in 2013. As soon as I found out, I tried to get our original Delta frequent flyer tickets to Maui back. Got the same outbound flight, but the return had gone up to a higher points category. I booked an overpriced points Marriott night at a Courtyard (my least favorite Marriott brand) and will fly home a day later than originally planned. No great harm done.
> 
> The guys are disappointed, but they are going to try to book the festival and a few other venues for 2014. I'm just glad we had Maui to "fall back on".
> 
> ...



I missed this thread when you started it a month ago // probably a good thing as I would have suggested you take a boyfriend to Hawaii.  (just kidding)

You said in an earlier post "Maybe we need to talk more".   

This trip might be just that opportunity...enjoy


----------



## djs (Oct 25, 2012)

ronparise said:


> I missed this thread when you started it a month ago // probably a good thing as I would have suggested you take a boyfriend to Hawaii.  (just kidding)....



What exactly were you implying?


----------



## MaryH (Oct 27, 2012)

Sheila,

If you want to go to Europe, try to plan it for 2014.  

I used to live in Paris and had been back briefly for a weekend in Feb and originally had planned to go again for a week in June.  Shortly after booking accomodation for June via RHC, I found out about reunion in October so had to change plans.  Was able to rent out the weeks which in term covered part of my costs for my October trip.

Do you have enough money or FF points to go to Europe regardless ?  If so might be interesting to look to planning a trip for 2014 around that timeframe and leave enough room that if the festival gig comes through for 2014 there is room in the schedule?

Just realized I crossed 1000 post.


----------



## sfwilshire (Oct 29, 2012)

MaryH said:


> Do you have enough money or FF points to go to Europe regardless ?  If so might be interesting to look to planning a trip for 2014 around that timeframe and leave enough room that if the festival gig comes through for 2014 there is room in the schedule?



Not enough ff miles to get there. Could come up with the money, but the vacation time might be more of a problem for an extended trip. The Manager of our dept just passed away so who knows what the management climate will be by 2014. 

Hard to look that far ahead since I may be forced into retirement by then. I'm hoping I can hold on until through at least the end of 2013. I still won't be able to afford to retire and travel like I want at that time.

Sheila


----------



## MaryH (Oct 30, 2012)

lol yeah I don't plan well that far in advance.  3 of my TS plans for this year I had to ditch and rent out since they did not work with work deadlines and other schedules and 2 other TS reservations I had to throw into exchange companies.  Then had to use hotel points to book what I needed.

Glad the Hawaii plans still worked out.


----------

