Imagine the daunting task
of searching more than 80 million airfares that are changing almost daily.
Also the great deals more
Bookmark us (Ctrl
+ D) and if you came here from a search engine you'll want to deploy the
helpful
left frame menu or go back to our main page for the full Carnaval.com
treatment.
indicates multiple languages supported
Computerized
Reservation Systems (CRS)
If you run into steep pricing quotes when shopping for airline tickets,
do not despair, You Always Have Other Options. Here's our
recommended procedures and web CRS tips & tricks to get
you there for less than the rest on your plane.
1)
Check different times, then nearby dates, then nearby airports.
Airport Codes & their Citiesmake notes of
all the possible airports and 3-letter codes for the most accurate and
hassle free searching.
2) Look for which airlines are serving your
destinationand check the site for specials/ promotions for these
destinations. Expedia
as well as Travelocity
have more of this type of information than any other sites.
Having low print cost per page (spelled HP laser printer) can help
keep information overload under control.
3) If you have been able to identify
seats on your flight that sold at a great promotional price but are
no longer available then save that information for calling the
airline later. Identifying the lowest cost seats sold on your
flight can result in better bargain shopping service from your airline
reservation agent.
4) Go visit the other CRS sites. There
is a growing difference even among the same systems because there is
an increasing number of separately negotiated marketing arrangements
to favor certain choice selections in the top spots and other
promotions. We recommend you give consumer oriented onetravel.com
a whirl
5) Surf the airline web site. There's
lots of internet specials these days. If you don't see your rate try
calling them especially if you have information or codes for the lowest rate
available on the flight which will trigger a true lowest price search
for you.
Airline & Airport Web Site DIRECTORIES Arranged in our best and then the rest format with
800 numbers too
6) Try an auction site or visit your
travel
agentIf your trip has multiple legs a mistake can be very
problematic and expensive to correct, use a travel agent. If you're
flying a busy corridor then your chances of getting a match at a reverse
auction site are good.
EXPEDIA:
The #2 travel site
and the fastest most useful trip planning tool on the internet. The airfare
screens contain some of the best options available for augmenting your best
available deal search. They don't send you junk e-mail unless you request it.
Still the most empowering part is being able to not log-in and immediately get
the information you request. Take the time to know your options here.
Owned 85% by Microsoft, Expedia is the major player most capable of
restoring a normal supply and demand market to airfares. However do not be
lulled into a false sense of complacency, all the CRS systems are now constantly
being manipulated by side deals to favor certain sellers with first screen
placement. They also have a priceline style reverse option for hotel rooms as
well as airfare.
WorldChoiceTravel
or USAHotels WorldChoiceTravel
log-in required for flights recently been rated the #1 Travel service by Gomez
Advisors In March
of 2001 TSI a major travel vendor for Europe & cruise lines and the owner of
flycheap.com, Mytravelco.com, AutoEurope, acquired WorldChoice. Watch our #1 travel partner grow
in the year's ahead to provide you " the best deal" that
combination of service and value that makes you a loyal satisfied customer
Italian || Spanish || Norwegian || Swedish || Dutch || German ||
French
Deals
& News. The latest on fares sales and other news from the world of travel.
Requires Log-in with password and searches wider range of times and dates to
find best prices between two USA airports.
The largest web
booker of travel services with total 2000 sales of $2.0 billion ( up from
1999 sales of $1.2 billion) Much
of the growth came from the March 2000 merger with #3 Preview Travel, Inc.
Travelocity.com is owned primarily by the #1 CRS or Sabre / American
Airlines which may indicate lowest prices may not be its priority.
SouthwestUSA
only Check for a special
Your fortunate if your USA airport is served by Southwest whose standard
low fares are then matched by big carriers. Popular Frequent Flyer
program. Tickets only available through their website following brief
association with Travelocity in 2000. The USA has been unable to grow a
similar discount airline for three decades now
Travelscape mostly specializes in advertising its low price guarantee on some
pretty ordinary pricing for hotel rooms but does have a full CRS system to
take a go.
(SystemOne/Amadeus) Guaranteed lowest published fare price or double the difference, System
One is the most popular CRS because it is #1 with with travel agencies
and includes the most flight data. Requires log-in.
travelforless.com/
Since 1996, Search over 500 airlines (including over 1.3 million
discount airfares.
Tiss.com Travel Information
Services (Travelocity-Sabre) Sign up to enjoy their fare tracking
service which will e-mail you or your pager with time sensitive rates
meeting your criteria. TravelSecrets.com
|| tricks
|| Secrets Searches the tiss data base and we liked
their interface better. Log on quickly as guest. BestFares.com
Discount Travel Magazine -- Online Snooze You Lose fares, Internet offers,
late-breaking travel news, and much more. Become a subscriber to get full
content. Itinerary
available on-line by.Sabre the leading CRN airline database.
Imagine the daunting task
of searching more than 80 million airfares that are changing almost daily.
Also the great deals are fleeting capable of expiring suddenly. it has been
this way for too long now but the web is changing the game dramatically.
With persistence and savvy you can achieve dramatic savings or enhancements
for little if any extra cost except your time. We like to remind you, that on the web:
"You Always Have Other Options" and we detail them here.
Airlines are not happy about these changes and have increasingly
added incentives for traveler to visit their
web sites.
"Airfares
are an intrinsically complex system, and much of that system is deliberately
obscure...The worst place to buy your ticket, if you care about price, is
directly from an airline"
BUCKET
SHOPS "You'll get the best price if you shop
around, but remember that rating an around the world itinerary can take an
hour of work (for which the agent is paid nothing if you end up getting
the ticket elsewhere). So don't be surprised that the fare isn't in the
computer and can't be given off the top of the agent's head; the agent
will give only a very rough estimate of the fare unless you make clear
that you are really serious about getting the ticket from that agency if
the price is right.
Bucket shops serve a limited and specialized subset of the air ticket
market, and are mostly concentrated in a few world cities. The best places
to find them are London and San Francisco; other places with many
are Penang and Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), Bangkok, and Athens. It's worth
looking far afield to find a good bucket shop -- the overwhelming majority
of travel agents don't even try to compete with bucket shop fares. For
that matter, most agents couldn't construct the sorts of routings the
better bucket shops specialize in (especially customized around-the-world
itineraries) at any price.
Consolidators means too many different things.
Here's a periodically updated article by Edward
Hasbrouckon the subject and
a word of caution from the BBB Find still
more on this popular subject at the Rectravel FAQ's Discounted
International Airline Tickets
Air
Ticket Farebeater (Amadeus CRS)l l
Book a Room
l l Car Rental
l l
Named PC Computing's #1 Bargain Travel Site,
Hype only takes you so far when price is the name of the game and these
guys can often win your shopping competition for airfare. Fast
feature search for their 50,000 hotel listings. Don't bother with
their car engine, others are much more reliable.
Book
onlinewith Economy Travel! (WorldSpan
CRS) No
log-in to search
The first screen lists lowest offered which can be helpful airline info
then it can take a while for "available" but the results can
indeed yield your best deal. In association with TravelSelect. "As one of the
largest international ticket agencies, we can offer savings between 10-40%
off of published fares on 24 major airlines. Our consolidator fares do
not appear on airline web sites or reservation systems, only here! "
|| SiteMap
|| Founder
Ad Latjes,
discount travel pioneer Get your FREE Airfare & Cruise Quotes from discount Travel specialists.
Your request will result in at least one hard to beat rate sent by e-mail
within 24 hours. ETN is a huge sprawling sight with a power to the consumer
subtext.
Arriving in 2000, better late than never. While
the huge different rates turned up would seem to be the killer app for a comparison
search engines we have found them of marginal value being both slow
and not as dedicated to lowest possible as one would hope.
itasoftware.com/
Check if their out of beta recommended by smarter living and claiming
comprehensiveness
Sidestep.com the first comparison search engine with an
aggressive install that calls itself up whenever you search air sites
slowing your search for often a null search.
FareChase.com
Seems to favor TravelNow's rather hohum fares
London: one of our 9 Carnaval Global Cities is also the great
airport hub for Europe. The stars of the show are three very low cost
airlines easyjet.com , RYANAIR
and venerable British Airways go-fly.com
As well as the hub for OAR's
Airline of 2001
EuropebyAir.com||
Airline
Maps
$99 between anywhere in Europe The $99 FlightPass covers 150 cities in
30 European countries or unlimited flights in 15 days for $699 Must purchase
coupons outside of Europe
CheapTickets.com Requires up front log-in but the
pricing is often the best you will find due to exclusive deals with airlines,
discount airlines not in other databases and an emphasis of serving up
the best price regardless of its availability
travel.yahoo.com/travel
Yahoo is packed with travel information for you. book mark (Ctrl-D) us in
case you get lost
TravelDiscounters.comUSA
Discounted best quote guarantee for USAIR
800-428-4322 || AMERICAN 800-433-7300 || UNITED 800-241-6522 ||
CONTINENTAL 800-525-0280 || NW 800-225-2525
DL 800-221-1212 Call them reserve your rate & then give em a shot at
saving you money Amazing
Low Fares.comUSA Lots of excellent prices for domestic USA travel. Easy Look up in
table and then call them to book 77 of 168 hours in the week.
Ticketplanet.com Our
founder stumbled onto creating the bargain, around the world airfare and
will use all our resources to get you the absolute lowest price!
airtreks.com
|| current
specials featuring
" the most advanced multi-stop
trip building tool on the Internet " airbrokers.com Also Pacific Rim Loops
One of the web's most popular activities
and a growing sector.
If you're getting too spread out consider using AuctionWatch.comto"Buy
anywhere Sell anywhere"
Travel
Auctions at yahoo.com Lots of available inventory to fly anywhere dirt cheap in return for
a high tab on hotel room
Ebay Most
of the airfare requires a minimum hotel booking yet still a wide variety
of offerings including very low prices on timeshares you could exchange
for a week anywhere in the world an RCI member timeshare resort exists
To
increase your odds of making a match, try submitting a request between 5%-25%
lower than the low current market price for your selected route. Standard
taxes, airport and/or passenger fees, and surcharges are included in the
price of each roundtrip ticketFlights
purchased through Flight Price Matcher may not be eligible for frequent
flyer awards, seat upgrades, or other traveler benefits and options
Priceline
was the pioneer who created a whole new price point for new air travelers
who could not previously afford travel but they are not consumer oriented
and their place in e-travel is yet to be determined. This service is great for the 21 days before liftoff
when other airline ticket data bases are all rising in unison.
Priceline.com!
||Bid
Tips To
play you must be willing to accept very little service or flexibility.
Use them after you know the lowest prices being offered on a popular route
and then try 20% to 30% less.
The Expedia
flight Price Matcher is similar except it will give you the lowest price
matching your criteria and not pocket the difference as priceline does. You cannot reject their offer
or as they say you must " be willing to prepay for a nonrefundable,
noncancelable,
nonchangeable ticket.
Each
week a number of major airlines, hotel chains, and car rental companies
offer highly-discounted, last-minute rates exclusively on the Internet
Smarter Living stores these rates in two large databases and lets you
access them for free. updated every Wednesday morning
11th
hour vacations
Help keep occupancy rates optimal and get yourself a dream vacation
including the air. Lots deals available well in advance too.
FlyerTalk.com
|| Lots of camaraderie shared among the intrepid accumulators of frequent
flyer miles and points. Get the inside track on the latest greatest deal
in their active forum
OAG
Airline of the Year Awards. || Awards
Summary A celebration of the very best in global air travel, publicly
recognizing
the highest standards within the industry. Voted for by a worldwide
audience of business travelers - subscribers to OAG print and
electronic travel information products.
Landings.com Aviation industry web directory.
You can "still" add your link for free. Very well organized
with thousands of listings
Travel.com
|| Submit
Your URL (ITN-Galileo Apollo)
Book on 500 airlines, 33,000 hotels, and 50 rental car companies worldwide
Aviation
Safety Data
Federal Aviation Administration’s official
repository of USA aviation accident data and causal factors updated monthly
All the databases are searchable no ratings or other analysis aids for
the thousands of reports however. Great links pages
Before traveling abroad, make two copies of the identification
page one to take with you and one for someone to look up at home should
an unfortunate situation arise... Traveling with kids may require
notarized documentation when not with both birth parents... Beware of
getting a 90 day visa more than 90 days before departure... Remember the
credit card you booked may be required by the airline.
Visa- Passport: Requirements & Expediting (Pets too) Its all here without much search effort. Don't put off travel docs and
services are cheap if you don't have the time or patience
Passport Services (mostly for USA & UK )
Visually referenced in our best then the rest format.
This
is our. Packed with fast facts on everything you need to
know before you go including visa, health airport and weather
"in the
airline industry, the "invisible hand" of the free market just
doesn't seem up to the task of aligning carriers' behavior with consumers'
needs"Tim
Winship frequent flyer authority atsmarterliving.com
Get and update on the lack of progress the 1999
US Congress made on addressing lack of consumer protections for frequent
flyers.
![[F]](topic.gif){kind=small}
Airport Codes & their Cities 
over 400 airlines.
feature search for their 50,000 hotel listings. Don't bother with
their car engine, others are much more reliable. 
Book
online
do
not appear on airline web sites or reservation systems, only here! " 
QIXO.com
Comparsion Seach AirFare Engine
EuropebyAir.com
