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What's with airfares these days?

wordmunger

wordmunger

macrumors 603
Original poster
Sep 3, 2003
5,124
3
North Carolina
I was pricing a flight from Charlotte to Spokane, Washington for this summer and the cheapest flight I could find was $580, and that was a three-connection redeye. The cheapest normal flight was over $700! What's up with that? I'm not paying much more than that for a trip to Europe this summer.

A more practical question -- we have to make the trip, so is it better to buy tickets now at this exorbitant rate, or wait and hope prices go down?
 
thats crazy. i bought round trip providence to seattle in june with one layover at JFK for about $265 round trip - including fees + taxes. granted i did buy those tickets 6 weeks ago. and i just bought roundtrip providence to chicago on southwest for the marathon this week for $150 nonstop.

i usually buy on Orbitz as it allows me to reserve my seat (VERY important to me.) Southwest obviously are bought on their site. i did some research on Kayak.com too.
 
I just paid $1053 for a R/T flight from SFO to NRT in early July, would have been cheaper if i had planned in advance but im always doing things last minute.

Ed
 
I think it must be something about Charlotte. I just found a fare from Raleigh that's $414 for a redeye and $475 for a normal flight. The 2-hour drive to Raleigh is probably worth a $1200 savings on four tickets.
 
Considering I used to pay $1500-$2200 on average for tix, I'm pretty happy with the $500-$600 I pay now (lotta refundable/less than one week out).

Something to remember is that certain markets have historically been heavily into bending the customer over - because they could. Cincinnati, Atlanta (not so much anymore), Charlotte, and a few others come to mind. Fortress hubs are the bane of the bargain traveler!
 
Well summer is approaching which means lots of vacationers and all. Gas prices usually go up this time of year and so do airfares. That being said, here are some handy tips I've used over the years to trim the cost of flying down some:

1. Booking as far in advance as possible generally means cheaper fares.
2. Staying through a weekend also helps.
3. Getting an outbound flight around midweek also seems to make it cost less. From personal experience, I've found Tuesday to be the best day for this.
 
shecky said:
southwest has flights from raleigh/durahm to spokane for $200 each way or thereabouts.
Click to expand...

Taking a look at the looking engine, I found multiple $99 flights from RDU to GEG and GEG-RDU. Seeing as those are two smaller airports, $100 for a transcon is not bad at all.
 
You shouldn't be asking "What's with airfares?" you should be asking why would you ever want to go to Spokompton? :p

But $700 is rediculous. Again you have to buy sooner rather than later. It is also the summer. These are probably two major reasons why.
 
cycocelica said:
You shouldn't be asking "What's with airfares?" you should be asking why would you ever want to go to Spokompton? :p
Click to expand...

I grew up in Seattle; I never EVER went to Spokane until I married someone from Pullman ;)

Now, from the perspective of the other side of the country, Spokane seems like a relatively nice place...


skoker said:
Taking a look at the looking engine, I found multiple $99 flights from RDU to GEG and GEG-RDU. Seeing as those are two smaller airports, $100 for a transcon is not bad at all.
Click to expand...

Wow! What's the looking engine and how do I get fares that low?
 
I'm in Canada and I booked a ticket for beginning of june to Hong Kong for $1700, but I have to change it to 2 weeks later and it'll cost me an additional $470 since it's "high season". :(
 
Best time during the week to purchase airline fares is Wednesday (midnight to 2 a.m.) at the local time of the airline. I have found this to be generally true, over time. It's when their computers dump unpurchased reservations at lower rates.
 
Not sure about that. Manchester to Alicante only set us back £80 ($160?), and that was 2 years ago. If anything they're getting cheaper here.
 
I may as well be among the first to chime in with how cheap flights in Europe can get. I got a return trip from Dublin to Hamburg a few months back for €50, which was a great price, from Ryanair. Normally it costs me around €120 with Aer Lingus, our national carrier.

I took a few internal flights with JetBlue last summer on the east coast. Around $100 one way, but great comfort, TV.. I thought it was great! Flying on Ryanair is cheap, but they sure let you know how cheap it is! It's like flying somewhere while seated in a McDonalds restaurant.
 
powerdave said:
I may as well be among the first to chime in with how cheap flights in Europe can get. I got a return trip from Dublin to Hamburg a few months back for €50, which was a great price, from Ryanair. Normally it costs me around €120 with Aer Lingus, our national carrier.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the fares in Europe are amazing. We're going Paris-Rome this summer for €15, and Rome-Prague for €1. But that doesn't help me get to Spokane...

adk said:
you get them by booking around southwest's schedule. Don't expect flights that cheap to surface if you're looking towards the first half of summer.
Click to expand...

Ah... Well, we can't be too flexible with our dates, but at least it looks like we can find something in the $400 range. $700 is just obscene...
 
Wirelessly posted (Vodafone/1.0/V705SH/SHJ001 Browser/VF-NetFront/3.3 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1)

Ed H said:
I just paid $1053 for a R/T flight from SFO to NRT in early July, would have been cheaper if i had planned in advance but im always doing things last minute.

Ed
Click to expand...

That's really not a bad price. Don't know if you'd have gotten much cheaper since it's in the summer. NRT to ORD is usually about 1500 for me.
 
skoker said:
Taking a look at the looking engine, I found multiple $99 flights from RDU to GEG and GEG-RDU. Seeing as those are two smaller airports, $100 for a transcon is not bad at all.
Click to expand...

If you bought your tickets last week, two people could have flown from Sydney to Tokyo for around $250 USD each. That's a 10 hour flight.

I could have flown from Sydney to Cairns for around $80 USD per person (if travelling in pairs). There are some fantastic rates out there. :)
 
wordmunger said:
I grew up in Seattle; I never EVER went to Spokane until I married someone from Pullman ;)

Now, from the perspective of the other side of the country, Spokane seems like a relatively nice place...
Click to expand...

Not to keep it off topic but...

It is hard to imagine Spokane as nice, but I have never lived on the opposite side.

I think Pullman brings people to Spokane. I had never went to Spokane till going to WSU in Pullman.
 
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