Best place to buy airline tickets online?

Southwest.com

 

expedia.com
travelocity.com

Expedia is what I usually use.

 

I'm with him. I did make use of southwest once though.

 

www.sidestep.com

 

cheaptickets.com --just bought 17 tickets lax-nyc

use them for cross country all the time

10% off if you call them on the phone


(i used orbitz/lastminutetravel/expedia/hotwire)

checking everything (cuz i am cheap bastard)....i alwyas find cheaptickets to be the best

southwest.com for cheap local

 

I just booked a one way flight last night to West Palm Beach for May 18th. I am driving back with my daughter from college in West Palm for the summer. I checked the rates on Orbitz, Travelocity, and Expedia. Plus I went straight to Continental, American, and Southwest.

I eliminated Southwest immediately because the flight required 3 stops and almost 10 hours travel time. That is just bulls@#t

I didn't want to fly at 5:30am which eliminated the cheapest flights on all carriers. I didn't want to arrive in the late evening, which precluded the rest of the lowest priced fares on all of the carriers.

I selected a 7:16am departure, with a 5:21 arrival, which was available on all three discount pages. The discount webpages were either cheaper or the same price as the carrier specific pages. I had a choice of 4 carriers in various mixtures on the "big three". Plus, I always go for the fewest stops I can.

The results:

Orbitz $282.00
Travelocity $315.00
Expedia $175.00

The Expedia fare was on Continental with one stop in Houston.

This example is not a hard and fast rule. I have found Travelocity to be cheaper sometimes, and Orbitz cheaper at other times. As a rule, I have found Southwest to be the cheapest. But because of the Wright Amendment, all flights out of Love Field in Dallas are severely limited which makes flying east difficult. I must either fly through Dallas or Houston, which always adds at least one extra stop.....and I despise taking off and landing. I am a big baby, and I usually have to be full of Dramamine to fly or I do the technicolor yawn.

The whole airline thing reeks of scandal to me. I don't understand how a flight booked on Expedia, can be cheaper than a flight booked directly on Continental. But there you go.

good luck

 

Same way hotel rooms work, I'm sure.

Continental sells those tickets as "loss leaders" to expedia for dirt cheap because Expedia has an agreement with the airline to buy 3 or 4 seats on every single flight, regardless if it's full or not. Expedia then sell those seats at a cheaper rate than if you go directly thru the airline, and put the marginal profit for your ticket in their pocket.

 

I remember seeing this concerning orbitz a while back. Since some of you are using them I thought I would pass it along. I don't know how accurate it is though.

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=orbitz_blows

 

it depends on where you fly to....one of my favorite is midwest airline. it costs about 20% more than others but every seat is first class with first class service (champagne and hot cookies)