Are you delaying those plane ticket purchases in hopes of falling fares?

[Carol C]

I'm waiting and watching for a reasonable fare to Europe this coming summer. I keep thinking if oil hits $100/barrel all bets will be off with airfares, international and domestic. With the euro at an alltime high against the US dollar, it all adds up to European vacations looking like luxury trips. If I do make it to Europe it may be my last such trip for a long time.

 

[Carolinian]

Wow, that is ultimately awesome, Carolinian. A bit different from the Research Triangle, huh? Gosh, I would love to do something like that - I really enjoyed my 3 month work exchange to the UK. Werr you required to have language fluency in the native language?

No, all of my local staff are fluent in English, so they can translate when needed.

 

[joestein]

It sounds like y'all are in violent agreement.

One way from FL =$69 ($138 RT)= lowest rate (+ taxes and fees)

Since Inbound is $89, RT=$158

Looks like $138 is the lowest!

I took his message to be $138 each way, not round trip, but I could be wrong.

I price Continental earlier this week and the prices roundtrip were over $400 per person. I thought I was very lucky to get this price.

Joe

 

[Bruce W]

$138

$138 was for round trip, should have been clearer. By the way, I searched my dates using Your Itinerary and got $128!!!!!.

The day before the $138 came up, I also saw almost $400 RT.


Bruce W

 

[gsturtz]

we should have a Forum similar to sightings for airfare. I'm dreading $4k+ for DW & kids VA to HI in July. If anyone sees a $138 RT, PM Me!

 

[Carolinian]

What will really bring some of these fares down to earth is getting some European LCC's or at least their style of operating into the US market, and that is already starting. Virgin America is already off the ground. An even cheaper LCC, RyanAir, is planning to go into trans-Atlantic operations and the business channels on this side of the pond have reported that they are also in the planning stages of a US domestic airline. Obviously they will have to work around the foreign ownership rules as Branson did with Virgin America.

 

[silverfox82]

A few months ago a friend asked to get her a price on AA JFK/SXM nonstop, sat to sat. Price was low $500's with tax. Next day went up $70, next week another $50. today $791.60. I think if you see a price you can live with, buy it and don't have remorse if it goes down.

 

[Dave M]

I agree. LCCs could result in lower U.S. fares - eventually. But not right away - at least not for most trips.

Here, from today's Wall Street Journal, are some excerpts from a story on higher U.S. airfares.

Regarding the year's remaining holiday seasons:

Ticket sellers say smart consumers bought early for Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday trips this year. Now, prices are up, and the number of open seats is down. Spurred by higher fuel prices, many airlines have boosted fares in recent weeks. And with some big airlines still cutting domestic capacity and demand for tickets running high, especially to beach destinations, the availability of cheap holiday seats has dwindled, experts says.

Regarding available seats versus demand:

...on the whole, capacity is up only slightly, and not growing as fast as demand. For the first seven months of the year, airline capacity, measured in available seat-miles, was up 2.8%, but passenger traffic was up 3.3% as more seats were filled.... That's allowed airlines to boost fares and stay profitable amid rising oil prices.

And, as the title of this thread asks, should you wait to buy those tickets?

"This is the first time we've ever seen people booking so early," says Amy Ziff, Travelocity's travel analyst. "People are definitely onto the fact that travel costs more and you have to buy early to get a seat."

And...

...it's not just the winter holiday period. Steve Cosgrove, president of Dynamic Travel & Cruises Inc., says he's now seeing double the volume at his Southlake, Texas, travel agency for trips for spring and summer of 2008, compared with the same period last year.

Draw your own conclusions, but don't take too long doing it if you have tickets you need to buy!

 

[TerriJ]

Because it is for our 25th anniversary, I went ahead and booked Hawaii tickets for next June. It makes me nervous to wait and think they might be even more expensive.

 

[Carolinian]

Another issue that can sometimes hurt in waiting is that all of the seats in the lower fare classes may be sold and even if the airline announces a lower fare for those fare classes, there may be no seats left in those classes on the days you want. All airlines have multiple fare classes of coach seats, all at different prices and with different restrictions.

As to seats selling out, I have been looking at tickets for family members on airlines I usually don't look at for myself because of ff miles issues, and was surprised at how many flights on trans-Atlantic LCC Iceland Air were already sold out, at least on the routes I looked at, for February and March. I also encountered some flights on Air France that were sold out for some days in that period. Flights are usually wide open for that period.

 

[falmouth3]

airfare to Phoenix

I needed an airfare on United to PHX in Sept. 2008. These are the fares that I found for the same round trip flights:
Sunday $325
Monday $387
Tuesday $305 - I put a hold on it
Wed. $487 - I booked the $305 fare
Thurs and Fri - $447

The flights are basically empty so I found the price fluctuation really interesting. It's not load factors changing the prices.

Sue

 

[Myrtle]

Anyone watching fares to Florence Italy?

Hi, Have plans for a first time trip to Italy in Aug. 08. Flying from Denver is pricey, UA has a flight through Germany that is great time wise at 12 hours. Other lines I've checked go up to 16 hours or so. I've been seeing fares of $1600 and more for coach which seems very expensive. Can any of you tell what would be a reasonable fare? If 1600 is the going rate I will just bite the bullet and book.
Thanks in advance,
Myrtle

 

[camachinist]

Got any frequent flyer miles? You could burn 25K r/t DEN-IAD and fly Iberia or TAP for about 500.00 less. Not a bad burn.

Or, if you can get to NYC:

Routing Details
Search: Departing NYC on 08/20/08 for FCO
Fare basis code WFLYAB
Flying LT

NYC-ROM WED-20AUG08 LT
TAXES/FEES NOT INCLUDED
ADULT FARES
CX FARE FARE C AP MIN/ SEASONS...... MR GI DT
USD BASIS MAX
1 LT 464.00R WFLYAB W | R AT

SPECIFIED ROUTE: 0300

DESTINATION ADDON ROUTE: 0008
NYC-DUS(AB/AF/AY/AZ/A3/A6/BA/BD/BT/C9/DE/EA/EN/FI/FV/HF/HG/IB/
JU/KL/LG/LH/LO/LT/IG/JK/JP/MA/OA/OK/OS/OU/OV/RO/SK/SN/SU/S7/TE/
TK/TP/UN/VO/V3)ROM
NYC-DUS(AB)MUC(AB/AF/AY/AZ/A3/A6/BA/BD/BT/C9/DE/EA/EN/FI/FV/HF/
HG/IB/JU/KL/LG/LH/LO/LT/IG/JK/JP/MA/OA/OK/OS/OU/OV/RO/SK/SN/SU/
S7/TE/TK/TP/UN/VO/V3)ROM
NYC-MUC(AB/AF/AY/AZ/A3/A6/BA/BD/BT/C9/DE/EA/EN/FI/FV/HF/HG/IB/

Or, call a consolidator

Pat

 

[Jimster]

florence

You might also consider flying into Pisa. Delta services Pisa and its not that far from Pisa to Florence-an easy train ride.

 

[Myrtle]

Thanks for Italy airfare tips

Both of you had good ideas and I will start looking at alternative airports. Was hoping to use my ff miles for business class upgrades so may have to pay full fare coach to get that done. Our ultimate destination is Chianti so will have to take a train from Florence anyway which makes Pisa a good alternative.

 

[winger]

...

Or, call a consolidator

Pat

What is a 'consolidator'?

 

[Dave M]

A consolidator is essentially a travel agency that specializes in buying seats from airlines - typically seats that might not otherwise be occupied - at huge discounts and selling them to the public at prices that are discounted to rates that are lower than what you can find through the airline or Internet search sites.

The advantage is the lower fare.

The disadvantages are several, but include the fact that the tickets are typically non-refundable and non-changeable. That means if your flight is today and you have a problem that delays you until tomorrow, your ticket is worthless. In contrast, if you had purchased your ticket from the airline or an authorized seller (e.g., Orbitz or Travelocity), you could cancel today's flight and, paying a change fee, use the value of that ticket for another trip. Typically, consolidator tickets don't earn frequent flyer miles. In some cases, you can't reserve a seat in advance, meaning that you might well get stuck in a middle seat.

You can often find consolidator ads in the Travel section of big-city Sunday newspapers. They are usually very small ads – often only an inch or two high - with very, very low prices. Also, if you use the word consolidator as a Google search term, you’ll get hits for a number of such agencies.

 

[Carolinian]

Whether consolidator tickets earn air miles depends on the airline, and that is one of the few areas that US-based carriers are better than their European competitors. I have bought quite a few consolidator tickets from several different consolidators for flights across the pond on NW and DL and never had a problem getting my ff miles. If in doubt, ask the consolidator if the ticket will earn miles.

 

[Dave M]

Adding....

Priceline and Hotwire are two well-known examples of consolidators.

 

[brp]

Whether consolidator tickets earn air miles depends on the airline, and that is one of the few areas that US-based carriers are better than their European competitors. I have bought quite a few consolidator tickets from several different consolidators for flights across the pond on NW and DL and never had a problem getting my ff miles. If in doubt, ask the consolidator if the ticket will earn miles.

Be careful with this. On some airlines the rules for earning miles are quite arcane...on the order of "tickets booked in this class earn miles unless between these destinations while this other class as the following, partially overlapping set of restrictions." It is possible that, even with the best of intentions, any individual at the consolidator company may not know the answer.

Cheers.

 

[winger]

Am I correct in assuming that consolidators won't be having much inventory for summer weeks to/from Hawaii, or any other popular destinations/times?

 

[Dave M]

Not necessarily. If you're willing to take the risks associated with consolidator tickets, go ahead and try.

Start with Hotwire and Priceline - today. You aren't committed unless and until you accept their offer. Before using either, it's best to study how the systems work at www.BiddingforTravel.com and www.BetterBidding.com

 

[Carolinian]

Be careful with this. On some airlines the rules for earning miles are quite arcane...on the order of "tickets booked in this class earn miles unless between these destinations while this other class as the following, partially overlapping set of restrictions." It is possible that, even with the best of intentions, any individual at the consolidator company may not know the answer.

Cheers.

To be certain, simply ask the consolidator what fare class the tickets will be, and then look on the carriers website to see if that fare class is entitled to miles. With the fares classes sold on most US carriers by consolidators, they are so entitled, but the safest thing is to 1) ask and 2) check.

Many of the European carriers in the last couple of years have not only cut miles on consolidator tickets, but often on many of the cheaper fare classes sold by the airline itself.

I suppose one could stretch the definition of consolidator to include Priceline and Hotwire, but they are not what I would consider a traditional consolidator.

 

[Carolinian]

Am I correct in assuming that consolidators won't be having much inventory for summer weeks to/from Hawaii, or any other popular destinations/times?

Traditional consolidators deal mostly in international tickets rather than domestic tickets. For those, you might need to use an operator like Hotwire or Priceline.

For trans-Atlantic tickets, I have found that consolidators generally saved you the most money in shoulder season - spring and fall. In summer, they had tickets availible but the savings over the airline were minimal. They had tickets in winter season, but airline sale fares then often beat the consolidator price. Only if there was not an airline sale on in winter did consolidators save you money.

 

[Ann-Marie]

We are also going to visit Mickey in May. I have seen $197 R/T from LGA. Anything lower than that is connecting. Those who got the really low fares from Newark, are they nonstop?