DVCers - When do you get plane tickets?

[Doug7856]

We fly Southwest from Baltimore so we generally purchase our tickets as soon as the flights are available. Right now Southwest is booking through October 28, 2005. The GREAT thing about Southwest is that the airline does not charge a fee to change the ticket so there is little risk booking a fare as soon as possible -- if a cheaper one is available later there is not problem changing the ticket.

 

[lulu71]

We go at the same times each year, so I have an idea of what it usually costs to fly. We fly SW, so for our Mardi Gras trips, we use FF miles since the flights are usually high since everyone and their dog is getting out of town. For December, we pay cash and the flights have been the same price for the last few years. We've also snuck in a trip when the rates were $39/each way. Once you get a travel pattern, it will probably become predictable when to grab the right rates.

 

[quentina]

I am the oddball here....I buy them the day that they go on sale. I believe it is 340 days prior (??). I buy them without having reservations. I have yet to experence a problem and the prices are always very cheap.

Kim

 

[CRSNDSNY]

I usually use expedia.com and check once right away to get a feel for the current fares. Unless it's a fantastic fare, I'll check once a week from there. You'll get a feel for the average fare that way, and when it drops you can jump on it. I've waited until as late as two months before the trip, but never later.

I use Expedia to monitor flight prices too...and I've actually seen price changes during certain times of day -- mostly on weekdays around noon-ish. I wonder if there is some reasoning behind this.

 

[JimC]

Usually six months out. Most of our travel uses FF tickets.

 

[cruise-o-matic]

Bought our tix for December a few days after making our ressies.

Flying Delta direct out of RDU. Since RDU has SW, the tix were $60 cheaper than out of GSO. We prefer Delta b/c they fly direct and have little planes, so that they are quicker to load/unload and you can wheel your luggage to the tarmac and they'll check it there. When you land, get your bags and bypass baggage claim.

Update:

Called Delta today and they switched our R/T out of GSO for no extra cost (about $200 difference total b/n RDU & GSO)!

Not only that, we got our flight times switched so that we can land at MCO at 8:30 instead of 10:30 and leave now at 6:30 PM.

Mo' Time with da' Mouse!

 

[bobbiwoz]

We have our Dec. tickets already. Delta has 2 non-stops out of Dayton, and we try to book them as soon as we know we're going. They are small planes, 1 - 2 seating. The cost that we see is from just a bit over $200 - to maybe $230. We were able to be "bumped" once so far, on the trip home, that bump paid for most of our Dec. tickets!

We were just going over our vacation plans and we booked our flights for the August trip in November.

Bobbi

 

[liznboys]

We fly Southwest from Baltimore so we generally purchase our tickets as soon as the flights are available. Right now Southwest is booking through October 28, 2005. The GREAT thing about Southwest is that the airline does not charge a fee to change the ticket so there is little risk booking a fare as soon as possible -- if a cheaper one is available later there is not problem changing the ticket.

Same exact thing here. We did just that for our May trip, rates went way down, so now we've got a $300 credit to use for the December trip. Perfect!

 

[jnrrt]

Are flights more expensive this year because of gas prices? We just wondered. The rule of thumb here has been that anything under $200 is a good deal, and go for it. But last year we saw lots of deals, strangely, out of a much smaller airport about an hour away (went round trip for $140), so we decided we'd rather drive the hour and save $300. But this year, even that airport would be lucky to see $200. We grabbed a Ding! fare for $89 each way, which when all taxes and fees were added came to around $190 each (out of our home airport, which is way more convenient) and have been feeling very lucky. I haven't seen anything else under $250 from here.

 

[jnrrt]

I had no idea that SW would credit you if the fare dropped! That's awesome. I doubt that they'll beat their own Ding! fare, but here's hoping.

Who else does this? I saw JetBlue at the top...

Thanks for the info!

 

[DisFlan]

We usually buy tickets about 3 months out. BUT - this time I'm glad I didn't. Tickets on American for October were $246 each when I got them 2 weeks ago. They've gone up to $353.

I have a feeling that we're in the process of watching the demise of truly "cheap" fares, except for maybe within a few days of a flight when they're trying to fill empty seats. And I don't want to wait until quite that late.

In the near future, more of us may be back to budgeting driving into our vacation time. Ick.

DisFlan