Secrets of Booking Good Flights
Kayak, Farecast, SeatGuru, Flightstats Can Help Avoid Costly Errors
Smart Senior Travelers Booking Online Delve into Details at Specialized Websites Before Choosing an Airline, a Seat, Airport or Specific Route on next trip
Since today’s airline travel is harder on seniors than on young people, it makes sense to check specialized Websites for detailed information about bad airlines, bad routes and poor seating before buying a ticket, rather than choose the lowest fare shown on a favorite search engine such as Expedia, Orbitz or Travelocity.
To begin, it can be worthwhile to shop for fares on a broader travel search engine such as kayak.com, which shows shoppers a greater variety of flights than a single site. Kayak also lets visitors truly customize their options -- such as looking for one-stop but not two-stop flights, narrow the range of layover times on a multistop trip, and narrow or widen departure and landing times. With Kayak’s tools shoppers can also add or remove alternative airports.
“Among the search sites, Kayak had the most flexibility and options,” wrote Anick Jesdanun of the Associated Press in a 2006 article. “Kayak was also easiest to use.”
Other broad travel search engines include Sidestep.com, Mobissimo.com, and Farechase.com – this last also being a favorite of some travel writers.
To see if it might be wise to buy immediately or to wait a while, try the site Farecast.com. It will tell a visitor whether the latest “sale” offered by airlines on certain routes are really a good deal. It also shows a recent history of prices once the visitor chooses a specific flight path.
“So many different Web sites out there are offering quote unquote deals,” Hugh Crean, chief executive of Farecast told the New York Times recently. “What you’ve seen in the past on deals is really what a brand really wants to promote from a marketing standpoint, distressed inventory or something with not a lot of availability out there.”
Before making a final decision it would be good to check the on-time history of the flights chosen as well as how good the seats are.
Flightstats.com is a favorite of experienced travelers because it can disclose whether a specific flight they are taking was on time recently. Flightstats tells how often a flight was on time, late or very late over the course of several months.
Finally, shoppers often are assigned seats or pick seats that are not comfortable for one reason or another. The Website Seatguru.com allows searchers to look up a specific airline’s configuration of a particular aircraft, pointing out which seats do not recline, have reduced legroom, or have misaligned windows.
Seatguru.com offers very detailed diagrams so a traveler can see in advance where exits, lavatories and closets are. It uses red, yellow and green to identify poor seats, so-so ones and superior seats.
