Filed under: Travel Tips
My parents, having never travelled internationally, asked for my help locating a cheap airfare for their flight to New Zealand in February. I wouldn’t call myself an expert but I did manage to score a $1200 round trip ticket to Australia last year. I guess it can be kind of a hassel, you can never tell where you’re gonna get the lowest price. Do you go with the travel agent or cheap flight search engine? Or check out the airlines yourself? Because there are a lot of them and it takes time to go through and check them all.
I usually start with Flightcentre because they have pretty low prices and can usually give you an idea of what the prices are going to be like. Then I check out a few of my favourite airlines and go from there. I find that when you check out the Airlines specifically you can often find web deals that you wouldn’t get through travel agents.
Mom and dad are in luck! Air New Zealand is having a seat sale for flights starting Feb 1, 2010. I flew Air New Zealand to Australia I was impressed, good food, good services, and the all important personal television sets in the seatback in front of me. Plus I got to stop over in Auckland which had some of the comfiest seats I’ve had a chance to doze on in an airport.
I also discover that when flying within New Zealand it’s best to book the flight on the local website, on the Canadian website it would cost my parents $300 each to fly down to Queenstown from Auckland. It seemed odd since I’d looked into flights from Christchurch to Queenstown for myself and it was only about $60. So I checked Jetstar and it was only $100 for the Auckland-Queenstown flight, that’s when I realize I was on AirNewZealand.ca so I checked out AirNewZealand.com.au and found the flight to be only $100 as well. Sneaky Air NZ, sneaky, but I guess you do what you gotta do. At least I could save my parents $200.
My tips for booking flights?
Check out the airlines yourself you can usually find better deals although it may be trickier if you have long connecting flights.
When booking flights within a country always use the local website.
