OT. Flight on short notice...

[palehorse]

Any advice on keeping the cost down on a flight with short notice? Need to book a flight departing late Thursday and returning Sunday. TIA

 

[Cosmos]

Any advice on keeping the cost down on a flight with short notice? Need to book a flight departing late Thursday and returning Sunday. TIA

More than one flying? If so, then book the seats separately. Sitting separately is cheaper. There's less demand for early and late flights. Use your rewards card. At least you'll get the rebate credited to your card.

 

[Eric_M]

More than one flying? If so, then book the seats separately. Sitting separately is cheaper. There's less demand for early and late flights. Use your rewards card. At least you'll get the rebate credited to your card.

Apologize for changing the subject but wholly cow, Marfa, TX? I took a group of customers to Cibolo Creek Ranch earlier this spring. Gorgeous place but man that is the middle of nowhere!

 

[interrobang]

Sitting separately isn't necessarily cheaper. But it's possible that booking separately would be cheaper depending on how many seats are left in the cheapest fare bucket. However, if you're booking last minute, there likely aren't many fare buckets left.

Do you need a hotel, too? Sometimes you can save a few bucks booking together on sites like Expedia.

Be careful with some of the discount sites like CheapoAir. Nothing wrong with them, per se, but their cheaper fares can be offset by service fees.

 

[nittanyfan333]

don't count out looking at two 1-way tickets. wife and mother in law just had to leave to go to Cali for a funeral, and while the wife got hers with points, mother in law found two 1-way tickets cheaper than a round trip.

 

[nittanyfan333]

OH, and if you do have a rewards card but don't have enough points, look to see how much it would cost to purchase points to get to the level you need to get your ticket. We've paid something like 2-300$ to get us to where we need to be points wise, then used points to get the tickets.

 

[pandaczar12]

I travel all the time for work on last minute flights. Sometimes booking within 4 hours of a flight's scheduled departure time. You are pretty much at the mercy of the airline. Sometimes it ends up being pretty cheap though... when I fly to FLL/MIA, it's usually about $90, even at the last minute. The last minute business class flights to Europe are a killer though!

1) Look for airports within reasonable driving distance of your final destination. Consider one way flights in and out of different cities, a cheaper combo can usually be found.

2) Trade vacation time for cheaper flights. Flying home Sunday will probably be more expensive than Monday.

3) If it's important enough that you NEED to book this flight, just pay what they are asking and forget about the cost.