Online Airfare Purchase
 

I have been watching the price for an open jaws flight for the past four months and the price has stayed right around $750 the whole time. Should I just go ahead and buy this now or should I wait to see if prices will drop?
I am leaving from Denver on May 16th (night) or 17th (morning) traveling to Amsterdam and returning to Denver from Paris on June 2nd.
I have checked a number of internet airfare sites, including the airlines directly, and have consistently found the best price through orbitz. This flight is on British Airways between Denver and London and is on Lufthansa on the other legs. What are your opinions of these airlines? I have never flown internationally before.

My personal opinion is that if the Euro, and perhaps Sterling, continue to rise against the value of the Dollar that this will trigger fare sales if reservations to Europe from the US fall significantly. However, those sales, if there are any, may or may not cover the time period in which you prefer to travel. Personally I'd probably wait a little longer. Would you be comfortable biding for a "blind" itinerary in which you don;t know which airline and could leave anytime within a specified 24-hour time period?
If you are no longer willing to wait then purchase the fare now AND FORGET ABOUT IT whether the prices go up or down and simply look at it as THE price you had to pay for your trip...and worry about other aspects.

$750 is not a bad price, especially if you leave in June. I paid $700 this past summer from SAT to FCO and from CDG to SAT...I could not find a cheaper fare..and I searched the internet for many months prior buying the ticket..

I too think it is a bit early to buy, but no one can say with certainty. I've had my best luck buying between 120 and 60 days before the travel date, but things are changing constantly so just pick a reasonable fare and buy it when that shows up.

I think places like Orbitz and Travelocity are useful, but they also have their limitations. Often their best prices are for a very small number of tickets and only on specific days. I also worry that they will cobble together an itinerary that does not allow for certainty of connections. i.e., if your flight on airline A is late, and they have only allowed 50 minutes to catch your next flight on airline B, you may very well miss the connection, and the airlines will be of little help as they didn't do the planning. I feel a lot safer if I have bought the whole ticket from an airline (even though they may connect you to a different airline) as I think the airline will have some obligation to get you where you want to go.

Hi Patch,

http://airtravelcenter.com/onetrav.htm
has what you want, nonstop, for $589 on United.