discount airline tickets sw

Drew C. Spaeth asked:


The men & women of the US military do an excellent job serving our country & do quite a bit of travel for business & when they go on leave. What most vets are not aware of are the military discount airline tickets airlines offer in appreciation of the valuable & often dangerous service they provide for our country.

In order to book your military discount airline tickets you will want to book your flight well in advance & call a number of different airlines to find the best offer. Each airline will have its own criteria for providing proof of your active military status, & you will want to have that proof ready & handy.

Once you have spoken with a number of different airlines & have an idea of what is required, be sure to check with online sites such as Expedia, Priceline, & Travelocity to see if you can get a better rate.

Take your time & do your homework. Given that active military folks are often on a tight budget, getting this discount can really make a difference. It is not uncommon to find military discount airline tickets that offer nearly 3/4 off regular price. That kind of discount can make the difference between getting home to visit family on leave when you would not otherwise be able to afford the trip.

For retired vets & those not on active duty, you can get military discount airline tickets by enrolling with a company called Veterans Advantage. In addition to the discounted plane tickets, membership with this company gives exclusive discounts on computers, sporting goods, movies, & much more. If you travel often & take advantage of the other benefits this company offers, a membership may be well worth the price.



Brian

John Lopinto asked:


Availability of a vast array of airline ticket prices is one that is perplexing to most airline travelers.  Only a handful of people who control the complex formulas that go into the science and art of Revenue Management inside the caverns of today’s airlines understand it.  To both the seasoned and occasional traveler alike, getting the best value in an airfare is the elusive dream that is difficult to consistently achieve.

However, there are some time proven axioms that one can follow to put the odds on your side in helping you to reduce the cost of your air travel:

#1 Change the Time You Travel

Don’t be rigid on the time of day you want to travel.  Going between New York and Los Angeles, for example, may have one airline offering as many as seven or eight flights on a particular day.  If you want to leave in the morning, investigate the three or four departures offered during that time period.  Moving your departure time by just one hour, on your departure or return, may save you a significant portion of the ticket price.

#2 Change the Day You Travel

Even if you require traveling on a particular airline or time of day, look at moving your desired departure or return day by one or two days.  It is often the case that a particular flight may be cheaper on a Tuesday than a Wednesday, or a Saturday instead of a Sunday.  The side benefit of this might be a free one-day “vacation” as the savings in airfare can more than offset the additional cost of a hotel room and meals. 

#3 Change the Route You Travel

Yes, we all like to travel directly from where we are to our destination as quickly as possible and without changing planes.  But how much is this worth to you?  Airlines often make connecting flights from your origin to destination less expensive than their non-stop flights.  It may add a couple of hours to travel time but it may be worth the hundreds of dollars you might be saving.  Airline websites, unfortunately, are designed to show you the most direct and shortest time between the cities you request.  If they have an option to “search by fare” use that option with maximum number of results possible and drill down deep in the results to make sure you see all the fares available. 

#4 Change the Airline You Use to Travel

Competition is a wonderful thing!  Many routes are highly competitive and it can force an airline with traditional dominance in a market to drop its airfares, sometimes dramatically, in response to a new competitor or fare sale from other competing airlines.  Often times these “sales” will happen on a moment’s notice and may only last for a few days.  If you have a favorite airline you wish to use, subscribe to their email alerts for your favorite cities so you can be kept up to date on any fare changes.  But, don’t limit yourself to just one airline.  Do it for all the airlines in your market.

#5 First Class Cheaper Than Coach?

No discussion of airfares would be complete without talking about the new currency for airfares: the frequent flyer mile.  More and more of us are accumulating these frequent flyer miles that pay for airline tickets.  Our first inclination when trying to redeem these miles is to seek out a coach seat using the lowest amount of miles, typically around 25,000 miles.  However, it is usually the case that the airline does not have any seats at the lowest mileage redemption level when you would like to travel but may have them if you use twice the miles.  Before giving in to this requirement, ask about business or first class awards.  You may be surprised how many times discounted business or first class awards may be available to and from your destination for the same or less or slightly more miles than for double mileage coach awards.  The extra comfort and perks are the icing on the cake!

Be flexible, keep current on airfares, explore all your routing options and look at all the ways frequent flyer miles can be redeemed.

About the Author

John Lopinto is Partner and co-founder of Expert Travel Services, LLC which owns and operates ExpertFlyer.com, the leading online information service for frequent flyers.  A 100,000+ mile a year frequent flyer, Mr. Lopinto travels extensively throughout Asia, Europe and North America to bring his unique perspective to the travel industry for the frequent flyer.  As a top-tier elite member for an international airline and alliance, Mr. Lopinto has first hand knowledge of life as an air traveler at all levels of service and experiences.

Mr. Lopinto also is President of a manufacturer of fiber optic transmission systems and high-performance computer-video interface products.  Mr. Lopinto previously held various technical and managerial positions in the Broadcast, Satellite and Cable TV industries.

Mr. Lopinto holds a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering degree. His professional affiliations include the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers and the International Communications Industries Association.

To learn more about how you can travel cheaper and smarter, log onto to http://www.expertflyer.com



Kimberly

Ahmad Abdullah asked:


Cheap airline tickets are not something that is so uncommon these days. They are without a doubt the best solution to travel for those who are having a very tight budget or can’t afford to spend too much on travelling itself. It is a good thing to note that cheap airline tickets are not that hard to find and it’s worth all the time it takes to find them.

Offers for cheap airline tickets can be found either by directly going to the airline company office or from the internet itself. Most people skip the hassle of visiting a high street travel agency by finding cheap airline tickets online. There are of course several advantages and disadvantages of booking and buying airline tickets from the internet.

One of the advantages of buying airline tickets online is the convenience of doing it inside your house without having to drive all the way to a travel agency office in the city. Within a few clicks, you are already taking out your credit card and preparing to confirm your booking. After a few days, the ticket is already arrived in your mailbox or ready to be picked up from the airline office itself.

In addition, there are a lot of travel websites that have the facility to compare airline ticket prices across many different airlines. You just simply specify your date and time of travel and the search engine will do the rest. Not just that, the airfare search engine will also pick up the best deals and discounts offered by any airline companies. This saves your time of having to visit each and every airline websites out there.

In recent years, there have been a lot of deals offered by airline companies and travel agencies exclusively online. That is another reason why you should check out any deals in the internet first before wasting your time driving to your local travel agent’s office.

On the other hand, although the process is simple, there are a few occasions where you can get frustrated while searching for the best deal available. This can happen when you don’t go to the right place to search for a cheap airline ticket. If you are jumping from one website to one website in search for your best deal, it can take you quite a long time to find one. By not doing it right, sometimes you will end up not purchasing the cheapest airline ticket available. It can get tricky if you don’t know what you’re doing.

Another problem when not dealing with a real person while doing your transaction online is that you won’t get much help had you come across any problems or questions about the deal. If you are dealing with a travel agent, he or she might give you suggestions on what is the best deal to take and whether there is any cheaper deal available in the near future. You won’t get to see much of this online.

To sum it up, buying airline tickets online can make your life easier by not having to physically go to your nearest travel agency office. Everything can be done at the comfort of your room. However you need to know which website to go to so that you won’t end up spending more time and not getting the best deal out there. Otherwise, buying airline tickets online is a must for your economical travel arrangement.



Tom