Cheap Air Travel Tips

The era of airline travel has allowed us to travel the world and connect in ways that have never existed before. We can visit family overseas and travel anywhere in the world within 24 hours.

With all this ability to travel, we are also faced with the expense of such travel. For the many who would like to find cheap air travel, here are some tips. The first thing you need to know is that you never need to pay ‘list price’. Airlines have many tiers of pricing, and the same seat can sell for prices differing in the hundreds of dollars, depending on where, when and how it is purchased.

- Ask the Professionals: Your first step would be to ask your travel agent for advice on when to purchase airline tickets. He or she will be able to give you some guidance as to which airlines offer discounts and when. For example, some airlines offer ‘earlybird’ pricing, and some also drop their prices as the trip date gets closer if no one has purchased the seat.

- Get a Promotion: If a scheduled flight is not full to capacity, whether due to cancellations or lack of bookings, some airlines will offer complimentary upgrades in seat class to selected passengers. Although this is less common than it used to be, it still happens occasionally. Your best shot at being selected for such an upgrade is to arrive for your flight dressed in a clean-cut, professional manner, and to be polite. You can even try asking at the check-in counter if there is any chance you can get an upgrade - they may offer it to you if such a perk is available, or may offer it at a lesser price than you would have paid when booking. Success will depend on many factors, such as the mood and authority level of the ticket attendant and the way you ask for it. They may also need to move passengers around for weight-and-balance purposes and can offer a better seat to assist in this process – you never get anything if you don’t at least ask! Also, you can sometimes get a free or discounted flight by being on an ‘overbooked’ flight and being willing to wait until the next one can be arranged for you, but this is not something you have any control over.
 

- Flexibility: Are you flexible in your travel times or dates? By going ‘standby’ on an airline, you can hang out and wait until a seat becomes free or someone cancels, and can often get cheaper last-minute tickets.
 

- 'Pre-owned’ Tickets: For an array of reasons, people buy tickets and their plans change. When those tickets are non-refundable, they may try and sell them to receive at least some of their money back. This is good news for you, as you can take advantage of some discounted prices (remember, if they don’t sell their tickets they get nothing, so anything they can recover is of help to them). On-sale tickets can be found many places, such as your local classifieds, craigslist online and auctions such as ebay; try google as well to search.