Cheap Airfare

Below are my top ten tips to save big on airlines.  These are the cheap travel tips that I use when booking my family vacations.

• Book well in advance.  Even the discount airlines prices go way, way up the closer you get to travel dates and the more the plane fills up.   The best way you can save, bar none, is book your travel as far in advance as possible.
• Travel late weekends.  The most expensive days to travel are Monday and Friday.  If you can fly on a Saturday or Sunday, you are going to save.  Don't compete with all the business travelers, book flights for the weekends and save BIG.
• Compare sites.  Try several different airline booking web sites to check prices.  It always amazes me how much they can vary.  My favorite is Orbitz.
• Sign up for Frequent Flyer Miles.  These miles can really add up, and there is nothing better than a free ticket.  The major draw back is there are very limited seats reserved for frequent flyer tickets.  This means that if you are going to use miles to buy a ticket, you really do need to book almost a year in advance.  I have over 1,000,000 miles that I have not been able to use simply because I do not plan my travel 1 year before hand.
• Try booking on a discount airline.  Airlines such as SouthWest and JetBlue really are cheaper.  They do not have all the bells and whistles, but they are cheaper and they are also more likely to be on time.  For pleasure travel, discount airlines just make tons of sense.
• Use a discount broker.  If traveling internationally, discount brokers can save you tons of money.  You do need to be very careful using discount brokers, because there are simply no refunds.
• Use a bidding engine.  Bidding engines such as Hotwire.com and Priceline.com can really save tons of money also.  If you set alerts to tell you when a ticket drops to a certain price range, you can capture the lowest prices.  You don't always know the airline you are flying, but by analyzing the flight times, you can usually guess closely.
• Stay over a weekend.  If your trips include a weekend stay, prices are cheaper!
• Try two city flights.  If you're quoted a price that's too expensive and the flight connects through an intermediate city, price two separate flights; one to the connecting city, and the other to your final destination.
• Look for airports in surrounding areas.  It is amazing how flying into an airport in the same city, but different area, can save you over 50%.
• If you run into problems at the airport, call the airlines service number rather than wait in line with everyone else.  It not only saves you tons of time, but you are likely to get priority and routed quicker than your competition standing in line.