it's kind of mind blowing how much unnecessary money people spend on air tickets.

do some research on the industry, be knowledgeable about the different websites / aggregators you can use (as well as student / under 26 fares), and know a good travel agent or two. also when searching for long hauls, start and finish at major airports, and use budget carriers for the final leg, if going to a place like phuket (example: lax-bkk-hkt or lhr-bkk-hkt).

sometimes, its even cheaper to get to major destinations by flying to nearby cities and connecting on budget regional carriers, e.g. lhr-bkk on whatever and then bkk-sin on air asia. it takes more effort to coordinate flights but can be worth it.

another tip is local bucket shops - you can still get good tickets to asia by going to or calling chinatown in london or SF for example (best time for this method is pretty far in advance or like 1 day before - i don't recommend the latter).

where it gets difficult is optimizing the flights you choose for your mileage accrual, but again, worth it if you know what you're doing.

FWIW i took ken_noye's example of LHR-BKK, starting a couple days after Christmas and coming back ~14 days later, and just kayak has a £489 return, including taxes and all. i'm 100% sure you could beat this with a travel agent (many of whom still get exclusive access to low fare-class, consolidated tickets) if you look around. if you wanna get to phuket then add the ~£50 return bkk-hkt on any of the budget carriers and youve got a ~£539 total, or more than £400 less than what he paid.

just think of what that £400 could have paid for in thailand..

People should sign up for email alerts for whatever route they need. (Personally, I use tripadvisor.com, but there are many others.) This will give you a general idea of what you can expect to pay. You will get an email any time the price drastically changes for that route.

This way I know that Washington, DC to BKK now runs about $1050. I know that a during the protests this route cost $870 and that is as low as it's going to get. You can talk about bucket shops, discounters, travel agents, weird search engines, but despite many _wasted_ hours looking for these deals, I found nothing, and you will probably find nothing as well. Once you get in the low-price ballpark, it usually isn't worth your time trying to save the last $50 and most of the time that last bit of savings comes at the expense of crappy travel days and hours/very limited choices. It's a little better for Euro guys because they have more discount airlines, but same strategy applies - you should know the going rate for something before you buy.

I will send you $5 on stars/ftp/party if you can find a better fare than on kayak, provided you also let me know exactly what agencies you used along the way.

The only time I've seen fares better than kayak is using FlyCheapAbroad but that only works when flying internationally and starting in the USA.

yes, also i forgot to mention signing up for airlines' newsletters and frequent flier programs, sometimes you can get good specials that way.

..and yes, i would generally agree that there is a "low-price threshold" that you can reach and the amount of time and effort you put into the last $50 or whatever will obviously vary for different people who have preferences as far as airline, times, whatever else. however, i have had it happen a few times where that last little effort uncovers a gem that saves $100+ (or was better for mileage accrual), which for me, is totally worth it

..and yes, iad-bkk is one of the most expensive routes in the world, $800-1100 is pretty rockin

well first of all $5 is not nearly enough to dedicate my time to that.

secondly prices fluctuate several times per day, but are usually in the same range depending on how much time remains before the flight (which is usually based on how many seats are left but we don't have that information obviously).

also even if i was to go looking for a fare, you didn't specify an airport or date range

call

Anyone want a couple of hundred on Stars orTilt for Thai Baht?

....

www.farecompare.com is awesome. Shows infinite different routes, scans 7 other major online ticket issuers as well if you want it to. Ive actually found its more annoying to have it search the other ticket issuers as it just creates a lot of unnecessary pop ups and the farecompare.com search finds me an awesome deal basically every time. For example i just did a search and can fly BKK - LHR one way on the 31st October for $495, $566, $576, $642 then heaps of flights in the $700 range depending on the carrier you choose and layover options. Also BKK - JFK on the 31st October is listed for $700, $771, $796, $957, $958, then heaps of flights in the $1000 range, again depending on carrier and layover etc. Fyi the $700 BKK - JFK has one 6 hour stopover in Beijing, so its not like you have to wait a day in an airport or anything like that, highly recommended.

The problem with all online travel aggregators, like farecompare or whatever, is that they don't list budget airlines.

For instance if I search it for a flight from Perth-Kuala Lumpur, it will give me a price from Qantas, Malaysia Airlines, British Airways etc. It will never give me a price from Air Asia - and I know for a fact that Air asia flies that route daily for under $150 each way.

That is why you shouldn't rely on online aggregators for booking flights, especially for routes that are obviously flown by multiple budget airlines (as BKK-anywhere and Phuket-Anywhere are).

Long Haul routes (6 hours+) are usually pretty safe to use the aggregators for because very few budget airlines have flights that far (the only exception I know of being Air Asia's KL-London route, or maybe a few routes flown by Cebu Pacific).

Link to $150 Perth - KL? Im finding it as $200ish+ taxes for total of about $275ish one way, using airasia.com website

Yo checkout http://www.skyscanner.net/ which includes budget airlines

from a good promo i guess it would be doable. requires well in advance booking though

early next year AUD$199 with taxes for example (16 jan onwards)

www.airasiaplus.com to search 15 days with one search with any route

Ah k, 3 months in advance makes sense. I hardly ever book anything more than 2-3 weeks in advance. That said www.airasia.com is still better than farecompare.com, at least for that particular flight but i also presume for other flights around SE Asia

Depends on how far in advance you book obv. If you book now for January then its $127+ tax from Perth-KL each way. The tax on the perth-KL leg brings it to $199, but coming back the other way the tax is only $25 so its $150.

If you book for like 4 days time, the cheap tickets might already be sold out which is why you are seeing higher prices. You might get lucky if search the days before and after though.

This is the route I take from Perth to Samui.

Perth-KL with air asia ($200)
KL-Samui with firefly ($100)

It works out to around $300 for a 1 way ticket from perth-samui, which is about 1/2 of the price if you went through Singapore, Bangkok or Phuket.

any Halloween celebrations in Phuket?

kayak.com shows air asia and tiger air both with tickets in the 200 range

more pics and arguing - less save $4 on airfare tips

who wants to play bowling

$400 is worth talking about, though.

Here are more pictures. But you can always post some if you like.

Anyway, I've found Qantas/United can have the cheapest fares even where I'm going to/from a local cheapo hub. I think Vietnam Airlines uses Qantas for subcontracting, though, so that might be why. But the cheapest I could get from HKG to SGN was $230 on United (they fly a daily route between the two airports). Think it was $280 w/tax booked 3 hours before departure. China/Asia Air were like $450 for the same hub-hub connection.

Yeah, Kayak.com shows air asia Perth-KL as $233, which is the regular price plus Kayak's $34 booking fee.

But Singapore is not Air Asia's hub. Hong Kong-KL with air asia is only $128 including tax.

**** you Mr. Davis

The thing is when you see a cheap price listed it isn't always available. I tried a few times thinking I had a good deal for like £650 - £750 but when I went to book they were no longer available and were now £1500+. Still looking at some of the other suggestions I cant find anything less then £900 that flies from manchester or birmingham.

ban