The days of the high street travel agent are almost gone as more and more people look to look their vacations on their own, managing the flights, the hotel and the activities using online resources. As this is happening more and more people have realized that they are not stuck with the prices that a travel operator gives them, but they can look for better prices and more reasonable deals on vacation spots of their choosing.
The two big costs of a vacation are of course the flights and the hotel and today we are going to give you some greta tips on how you can bring down the cost of your flights, and ensure that you get the best prices available. Here are the steps which you should follow when looking for flights for a vacation or for your next stop.
Aggregators
The first step when looking for the cheapest flights is to hit up some of the aggregators which you can find online. The best of the bunch that we have found is www.justfly.com, this is a brilliant website which you can use to find flights from your destination to anywhere in the world. This website takes the pain out of searching through each individual airline and they will offer you the low prices which the airlines have to offer on your chosen dates. What we love about this is that the prices include taxes so there is total transparency, plus the flexibility of easily switching up search dates and finding flights which go either direct or with a stop. If you know exactly where and when you want to go then don’t forget to add your email address so that you can be alerted when cheap prices to your destination are made available. With online flight aggregators they do the hard work so that you don’t have to.
Connecting
If you are a little flexible with your time then why not look at taking a flight which has a connection mid-way through? This is a sure-fire way to reduce your flight costs and in many cases it won’t cost you much more time than a direct flight. Last year we flew from London to Mexico City via New York, at a cost of just £550 return, the direct flight for London to Mexico City would have cost us £830 and the flying time would have been 11 hours, with the stop off in New York our travel time was 16 hours. We spent 5 extra hours of our time in order to save almost £300 each, well worth it.
Credit Cards
If you regularly use a credit card then it might make a lot of sense for you to get one which offers rewards such as air-miles and frequent flier points. This is something which my husband and I both do and it usually ends up getting us a free flight each year for one of our children. If you are spending money on your credit card anyway then it makes for a great idea to put your money to work and to earn rewards which you can then use on bagging yourself some cheap flights.
Private Search
It doesn’t happen on every site but there are some which will put the price of a flight up if you have viewed it on multiple occasions and not purchased tickets. This is a really sneaky trick which some of the airlines do and you can get around it by simply opening up a private browsing session before you start looking at your flights. As we say, it doesn’t happen all of the time but the fact that it is possible means that you are better off being safe rather than sorry.
Follow Online Fare Hunters
Across social media you’ll find profiles of people who make it their job to look out for super cheap fares and airline errors which result in fares being incorrectly priced. Many of these operate on Facebook and once you find them you’ll notice that they have their own site where they promote these prices. You can either stick to social media and be alerted to any cheap deals, or keep an eye on their website so that you are notified for any super cheap deals on offer.
Follow these tips and you will be sure to get yourself the cheapest flight for your vacation or your next trip, and that will leave lots more money for spending in your chosen destination!
