What are some better sites to score cheaper Airline tickets?
- Thread starter SEPATOPTEN
- Start date
If you are flying International, try CheapO Air. They are not only a great price, they actually have a real Customer Service Phone Line if you have problems. For Domestic Flights, I go to Trip Advisor and they show which flight services are the cheapest and most convenient.
Just fly Southwest. Anything else is going to crush you on bag fees and upcharges.
CheapoAir is fine as long as you don't try to book add-ons (like airlines that charge for picking seats, baggage, etc).
I did that last summer for a flight from Germany to Spain. Despite my reservation showing my seat was confirmed and that I paid for baggage, they never actually did so. Their customer service was nice, but basically said "oops, nothing we can do about i t"
To the OP's question, there really is no site with cheaper fares than others. Your only option for "cheaper" is Expedia or one of the many sister sites that let you book flight/hotel together. Sometimes you can get some savings there.
GWA....Gambit World Airlines, has a few cheap seats with terrific views. Order online and use the discount code scared-as-shit.
Are you asking for the bowl game? Check allegiant, they fly into a few Florida airports and you can often get crazy cheap flights with them. Sanford and St Pete are probably the two closest to Orlando
Gotta go to Pittsburgh or Philly from State College to use southwest. I know people fly out of like Harrisburg or some other small city to St Pete for like $70 or something like that also. Flying from SCE to Phl is more expensive than a southwest flight from philly to orlando.
John Urschel's got nothing on you!!By my math, that’s 25 years.
I wouldn’t fly Allegiant either. It’s a matter of time before their planes start falling from the sky.
Well, hopefully not. The biggest trouble with Allegiant is cancelled flights. If they don’t sell enough seats they just cancell the flight and you’re stuck.
I try to avoid airlines that fly ancient jets. Allegiant and Delta both still fly 30-year-old MD-80s, which is based on the DC-9, a design from the 1960s that would never be certified today.
In Allegiant's case, you combine old hardware with a maintenance operation that has repeatedly been cited by the FAA....There's still a margin of safety, but whatever it is, it's a slimmer margin.
In fairness the MD-80 hasn't had a really bad crash since Alaska Flight 261 in 2000. But I would just prefer something built in this century or close to it.
In my best Norm MacDonald voice....
That’s the biggest trouble, until planes start falling from the sky!!!
And as for the OP's original question -- just use flights.google.com, or Kayak or Expedia or anything.
Whether a cheap flight is available pretty much depends on where you are flying and when. Probably 60% of routes within the U.S. are controlled by the cartel -- American/United/Delta -- so true bargain fares do not exist because competition does not exist.
Whether a cheap flight is available pretty much depends on where you are flying and when. Probably 60% of routes within the U.S. are controlled by the cartel -- American/United/Delta -- so true bargain fares do not exist because competition does not exist.
Allegiant doesn't fly MD-80s anymore. Delta does, but theirs are an average of 25 years old. American also does, at 20 yrs old.
BTW, there are new airliners based on designs from the 1960s.
Can you truly get cheaper flights through Expedia, Priceline, or cheapoair, rather than booking directly at the airline brand website?
The reason I ask is that I know many hotel brands will guarantee the lowest hotel room rate if you book directly on their hostel website (Marriott, Hilton for example), rather than booking on hotels.com, Expedia, etc... The hotel brands prefer to not pay the 2 or 5% commission to these third party online travel intermediaries, so they will guarantee the lowest hotel room rate. Knowing this fact pattern, I use Expedia as an informational resource to locate the hotel I want, and then I will go to the hotels website and book there.
You can't get cheaper airfare through those sites, but you can get reduced hotel pricing if you book flight+hotel.
I really like Southwest as an airline but I can almost never find a better deal with them than on any other major carrier. For me, Southwest's prices are routinely $25 more expensive than American, United, etc. which is exactly the cost of the baggage fee, so it's basically a wash.
Sites like Kayak generally have the same fares and the airlines themselves. In many cases when you click to buy the fare on Kayak it just routes you directly to the airline's website to purchase it there. Unless I'm getting a pretty significant savings, I tend to use these sites just for price shopping, and then I buy on the airline's website directly. This helps if there are any hiccups with the itinerary, you get better support for any necessary rebookings. If you buy on Priceline for example, you need to contact Priceline for help and they will need to work out reroutings with the airlines. That's an extra step that I try to avoid by dealing directly with the airlines whenever possible. Of course sometimes the pricing on this aggregator sites is just too good, and I just accept the risks of buying from them directly.
For me it was like that for a couple years, though lately Southwest has had cheaper options. They also have more non-stop options since they don't really have a hub model
