Any ideas when the big companies [I'm interested in NWA] discount fares??

[TnTWalter]

I'm looking for October...would I be best to wait for NWA sale? Or is it better to book now? I know the 'budget' ones are better closer, but NWA has flights I like better...

Also do they price adjust if you buy now and it goes lower? Thanks.

Trish

 

[Jestocost]

Depends on the routes, the competition and other factors. On routes served by Southwest, however, you frequently see that the current fare sale for the legacy carriers "coincidentally" runs through the dates that Southwest has available. Right now out of St. Louis, for example, AA has fare sales through August 24 on routes served by SW. The past few years SW has released reservations through at least the third week of October sometime in early May. I would expect the first round of fare sales from the legacy carriers to come then, so I would start checking in earnest. I know I will be.

 

[jekjones1558]

NW does not price adjust. Your only option would be to pay a $50/ticket change fee, which is obviously not helpful unless the price difference is greater than that.
I feel your pain with timing of fares. NWA has a hub here and so we can fly virtually anywhere non-stop. The downside is that this leaves little competition to keep prices down.
I have found that when Airtran and Sun Country come out with their fares (often not until 8 or 9 months out), NWAs fares become competitive. If you are not flying at a very busy time (wouldn't think Oct. would be), you can probably afford to wait a while. Hopefully others will post with their experiences. Farecast doesn't really help until 90 days out, and I, for one, don't like to wait that late to book air tickets.

 

[jodifla]

NWA's fares for October are quite high right now. I'd monitor daily on a search engine like kayak.com, and watch the trends.

I have an October flight to take as well, and won't touch the price now. It's pushing 300 for the flight I want, and I'm sure I can get it for half that if I wait

 

[Jestocost]

I have found that when Airtran and Sun Country come out with their fares (often not until 8 or 9 months out), NWAs fares become competitive.

This is why knowing who serves your airport is relevant. Sun Country doesn't fly out of Indy, so their fares won't have any impact on pricing from there. AirTran has fares available through part of November, so any competitive adjustments already should be reflected until they crank up a sale. AirTran is worth keeping an eye on for you, however. Southwest doesn't serve Minneapolis, so anyone used to watching NWA fares from there won't have them on their watch list. Trust me when I say that SW pricing will be the key for fares from Indy.

 

[Cdn Friends of Pooh]

We're flying with NWA in october and what we've found is that if you wait, you can get a better price when a seat sale comes up, however, the preferred flights are usually long sold out.

As an example, on the date we flew from Edmonton to Orlando last year, there were two morning flights to choose from. The first only had a 90 minute layover in Minneapolis whereas the other had one two hour layover in Minneapolis and a second 2 hour layover in Indianapolis. The other option would have had us leaving early afternoon and arriving in Orlando 11:00 pm.

We bought our tickets for the first flight and by the time the seat sales came around, that flight was long sold out. To some it may be worth the extra money to wait and take less convenient flight times. It's like anything else on vacation...you can spend more money for convenience but if that particular conveneince isn't particularly important to you, you can save money.

 

[Cdn Friends of Pooh]

Forgot to mention...NWA does price adjust if you're flying first class, giving you a credit for the difference between what you've paid and the lower fare. That's why we've already booked our NWA flights for October...nothing to lose!

 

[bab31]

I know..I am watching airfare to San Fran for June and just not seeing much in the way of great airfares. Just not sure if I should wait a while yet or just grab a good flight time.

Any opinions?

 

[TnTWalter]

did I forget to mention that? Thanks.
Trish

 

[delilah]

We generally fly NWA from Indianapolis to Florida. In my experience, the fares don't vary much from purchase, except getting more expensive closer to the trip. I purchased our tickets for May last November, and they are about the same fare now for the particular times I wanted to travel. Furthermore, in my experience, the non-stop flights are totally booked by the time the 90 day seat assignments are made. But, the airline assigns seats, so, you might not be seated near your family, if this is of concern for you. Since all the seats are already assigned, trying to change on the website in usually of no avail.

 

[Gary M]

I live in Muncie and fly out of IND 10-15 times a year, of which 2-3 times would be to MCO. I'll give you my past experiences knowing that the future may not be the same. Three airlines fly n/s from IND to MCO and they are NWA, SWA and AirTran. I wait until both SWA and AirTran come out with fares for the dates I want to fly and then start checking NWA also. It may take a couple of days for the fares to come down, but check everyday. I have found NWA to be very competitive with SWA and AirTran and many times less expensive. If you can be flexible by a day or two on your trip, you may get a better fare. I just flew r/t from IND to MCO (Jan.28-Feb. 2) for $117 on NWA and that included all fees and taxes. I made the reservation on December 14. I don't expect this low of fare each time, but around $150 r/t out of IND to MCO is very common during the slower times. I dislike the "cattle call" with SWA, so I try to avoid them whenever possible. The couple times I flew SWA from IND to MCO, the pre-boarding was at least 1/2 of the plane and I believe the plane comes from Chicago.

Below is a link to IND. Click on "about IND" at the top and go down to "our airlines".

http://www.indianapolisairport.com/

 

[Starr W.]

I live in Muncie and fly out of IND 10-15 times a year, of which 2-3 times would be to MCO. I'll give you my past experiences knowing that the future may not be the same. Three airlines fly n/s from IND to MCO and they are NWA, SWA and AirTran. I wait until both SWA and AirTran come out with fares for the dates I want to fly and then start checking NWA also. It may take a couple of days for the fares to come down, but check everyday. I have found NWA to be very competitive with SWA and AirTran and many times less expensive. If you can be flexible by a day or two on your trip, you may get a better fare. I just flew r/t from IND to MCO (Jan.28-Feb. 2) for $117 on NWA and that included all fees and taxes. I made the reservation on December 14. I don't expect this low of fare each time, but around $150 r/t out of IND to MCO is very common during the slower times. I dislike the "cattle call" with SWA, so I try to avoid them whenever possible. The couple times I flew SWA from IND to MCO, the pre-boarding was at least 1/2 of the plane and I believe the plane comes from Chicago.

Below is a link to IND. Click on "about IND" at the top and go down to "our airlines".

http://www.indianapolisairport.com/

Thanks for that idea, we fly out of DTW(NWA,SWA, Air tran and Spirit). We got our flights on NWA for May at 200 R/T, the same flights now are 268 last I looked.

NWA will be competitive if not cheaper sometimes then the other 3.

Also could fly Allegiant(sp?) out of Toledo, but they tend to not fly the days we want to go, plus DH is 6'4" so kind of a tight squeeze.