Want to book your flight tickets? And that too at the cheapest fare possible? Well, for all you travel enthusiasts who are always on the go, we’ve got you 7 tricks that will help you book cheap flights. So, get ready to tick new destinations off your travel bucket list without burning a hole in your pocket.
1. Be flexible with travel dates
You might have come across websites claiming that booking flight tickets on a Tuesday or travelling on a weekday would save you big bucks. But that’s not always true. So, we suggest, you check out the prices for the entire month. This way, you will get a clear picture of days that are cheaper for your destination. Where do you check the monthly prices? Browse through Google Flights, Skyscanner or Hopper. Either try it on the website or the mobile app. What you have to do is simply feed in your departure and arrival cities. First, check for a one-way fare. Click depart, do not enter a date, instead select the whole month. Then, click – search flights and you’ll get to know the date which offers the lowest fare. Now, follow the above steps for your return flight to get the cheapest fare. If you’re booking on the mobile app, you can view the price chart and book accordingly.
2. Go for incognito mode
You might have noticed by now that flight ticket prices change after you are done searching a few times in your web browser. Do note that it is because of the cookies in your browser; it’s because when you search, flight prices change and increase when a particular route gets repeatedly searched so as to trick you into booking the flight tickets quickly.
To avoid falling into traps, always search for flights in incognito mode to see the lowest prices.
3. Clear your cookies
As mentioned above, ticket prices of flights fluctuate based on the cookies in your browser. Cookies store the recent information of your search history, which is used by travel search engines or airline websites to determine the price to be shown to you. Next time, be careful to delete the cookies and browse flight tickets in incognito mode to check out the lowest prices.
4. Go for non-refundable tickets
By norm, non-refundable tickets are actually cheaper than refundable ones. As such, if you are very sure of your travel dates, go for non-refundable ones and save some extra bucks for your trip. Also, booking a round trip ticket is also a great way to save money.
5. Check the frequent flyer program
As they say, loyalty can go a long way, you can enrol in a frequent flyer program to get great discounts. A loyalty program works in such a manner that every time when a traveller picks a particular airline, points are added to your account. Then, by accumulating those points, they can redeem them to book flight tickets at discounted prices. Look out for credit cards that are tied up with certain airlines that will help you to build up such points more quickly.
6. Follow airlines on social platforms
Social media platforms have changed the lives of so many people. So, you can also make some small changes as a consumer and reap some benefits. For this, follow the airlines on social media and keep an eye on promotional deals that the airlines offer to book even last minute tickets at surprisingly low prices. You can even subscribe to the airlines, to get notifications of flash sales and special air discounts. If you are lucky, you can save as big as 50% on ticket fares.
7. Use flight search engines
If only you are patient, you can get a great deal following this tip. Before booking a flight ticket, it’s also an ideal idea to search multiple search engines, which will allow you to compare prices offered by different sites for different flights and dates; plus, you will also get price drop notifications. No search engine remains consistently, so try a combination of search engines to get the best deal for yourself.
