How do you get great rates on airlines waaaay in advance?
 

My wife is a school teacher so we travel to Europe during schoold holidays. As soon as the school system publishes their calendar for the year we know when we want to go. Then we start watching airfares on things like Travelocity's fare watcher. Only problem is it only looks a couple of months into the future.

It seems like the airlines would give you a break to get a ticket sold way in advance. Is there something I am missing on my trip planning? I figured some of you smart travel-aholics on Fodors could give me some tips.

Hi AS,

The best deals are usually 5-3 months in advance.

Look at www.mobissimo.com for round trips.

http://airtravelcenter.com/onetrav.htm for open-jaw.

I think airlines have the opposite philosophy..they will only mark down a seat if it is not selling well. Otherwise, why should they..?

I agree with Travelnut. The airlines may have "sales" when they have better ideas about demand vs. supply, the economy, travel trends, overhead costs, fuel charges, etc., and have no reason to discount a seat really far in advance.

I usually book my flights through the airlines' own websites. It may be different in the US, but the European airlines I use most frequently - bmi, BA, Alitalia, Air France, etc - usually show fares a year ahead, and generally are cheaper the sooner you book. The reason is that they have certain numbers of tickets at different prices (so they can advertise "prices from only £xx"), and once the cheapest ones have gone, you have to buy a more expensive one.

I sign up with the airlines email notification so whenever there is a sale I find out immediately.

Iagree with everyone, actually.
I'll use an example that I think is applicable.

Almost every year I fly to the same place for a weekend in October. If I book it now, I'll likely get a bargain. If I wait until August, it will be more. If I wait until October I may get a last-minute bargain. The rule is, there's no rule, imo.

No flights are bookable industry-wide until 330 days before the travel date.

Most years the rule would be buy early because the odds of prices going up are way greater than the opposite.

This year it's not so clear. First, the dollar may have bottomed against foreign currencies (yeah I know, ha ha) or close to it. Second, the price of oil may loosen up (and the savvy of airline futures-buyers improve - yeah, I know, ha ha). And third (and most important) many of the major airlines are rapidly adding seat inventory to their foreign routes (at the expense of domestic) so there may some surplus capacity. OTOH, if the dollar stayes cratered, the excess capacity will be filled by folks traveling the opposite way, en route to Century 21 and Rodeo Drive. (Or is that stereotyping? Sorry.)

Bottom line, this year I'd wait a spell, but monitor fares like crazy, especially from big gateways like NYC or ORD (often cheap domestic ticket + cheap gateway ticket < ticket from home all the way.) Also familiarize yourselves with the low-cost carriers' offerings. Adding on an LCC from a European gateway to your final destination can save major shekels compared to flying all the way to where ever.

The Wall St Journal had an article last year saying that the policy on when fares were lowest varied quite a bit according to airline. Some carriers sell out their cheap seats very early, whereas others wait and post lower prices closer to actual flight dates.

I don't remember now which airlines were which, and I suspect it doesn't matter much what they were doing a few months ago, because nowadays every airline seems to be desperately searching for new ways to maximize revenues, and probably will be constantly changing whatever they were doing in the past.

Anyway, as others have said, the best thing to do is to monitor the fares constantly, and also try to find out what the airline policy is on refunds if they post a lower fare after you have booked. We got a refund on American when that happened with us last year, but I don't think all airlines will do that, and of course, you have to find out about the lower price and ask for it right away.

Bear in mind that things can change (fuel costs can vary, competition can wax or wane, people may fly or not), but my experience is that US airlines (absent the occasional promotional sale) maintain a very high price from the date the tickets become available until four or five months before the date of travel, when they start to lower prices. But two months before the date of travel, prices start to creep up, a month before the date of travel all the deep discount tickets are gone and prices start to soar, and you would not believe the cost of a same-day ticket. One would think that they would be eager to fill a vacant seat at any price, but they apparently would rather let it fly empty than set a precedent that could lead to us all vying for that vacant seat, rather than paying a higher fare.

So I always look for sales, but if one doesn't come up, I buy between 4 months and two months before the date of travel, and I have, so far, been pretty lucky with this system.

Understand, however, that tickets during high season are almost always higher than during the off seasons. They know very well that those of us who travel with our children can only travel during certain times.

Another suggestion is to look into Priceline. If you go to www.biddingfortravel.com, there are several posts under 'winning bids' that show great airfares won, such as SFO-LON in August for $400...

Do your research before bidding though!

Thanks to all of you for all the advice. I have been checking the alternate websites you suggested and will continue to do so. I will also start of monitor the websites of the carriers themselves. We fly out of Seattle to Europe and there are only three airlines that go over the pole from here and that is much shorter so I will keep an especially keen eye on BA, SAS and KLM/NW.

Or, they could just keep the prices high until 24 hours before departure time, then begin automatically decrementing them every few minutes until someone bought in.

I wonder if that would work. Of course, they would have to prohibit cancellations within the 24-hour window, or people like us would game the system by buying cheaper and cheaper tickets and canceling the more expensive ones previously booked.

AisleSeat, also keep an eye on Lufthansa's nonstop FRA service from Portland. Rumor has had it that LH may relocate that service to SEA one of these days. There was also talk that Air France was looking at SEA-CDG, but now that AF=KL (=NW) that's hard to imagine. BA consistently seems to have the best prices ex-SEA for transatlantic coach, although still above California originations. The downside is Heathrow awaits.

Gardyloo, I will keep an eye on Air France. For some reason for us it ususally ends up with SAS being the low-price winner. It probably has something to do with when we book the tickets.

It's the low-cost domestic airlines that have bargain airfares available many months in advance. We're talking JetBlue, Southwest, for example. The closer the travel dates the less likely you will find bargains on these carriers. For international, trying to book many months in advance will elicit very high prices. I agree with other posters that it may pay off to wait a few months, probably not later than March for early summer discounts.

Also keep an eye on the Mileage Run forum on Flyertalk.com - http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=372

Usually the mileage addicts there (yeah, okay, my ain folk) spot the deals before anyone else.

I always check out the flexible fare option on Travelocity to see if I can save money by departing and returning on different dates than my original choice. Leaving just a day later, or returning a day earlier, etc., can sometimes make a fair amount of difference in the fare. If you have the whole summer to go, for example, you would have a lot of flexibility about departure and return dates.

I should also suggest that you post at the cheap flights forum at
http://eurotrip.com

They are constantly finding great deals before almost anyone else.

Wait, I just reread your post... your wife is a school teacher????

OK, go to www.statravel.com and www.studentuniverse.com. Both are sites for cheap student AND FACULTY fares. I believe one has the requirement of a .edu email that they can verify. One also allows tickets for spouses -- I don't recall which one.

I was able to get tickets for my husband and I (I'm a part time teacher) MIA to LON, Virgin, non-stop, August, for $350 each. They also had a $25/per change fee and a $50/per cancellation fee (unheard of in cheap seats).

Good luck!