USVI-On-Line

Sometimes there is serious money be saved with odd ball itinereries. I'm getting ready to book one which brings to mind some tips:

1) Don't book adjacent legs on different airlines. If airline 1 arrives late and airline 2 is on time you may be left with no recourse to get to your final destination. This is pretty common with Cheaptickets.com itineraries where United might get you ATL and then Delta gets you to STT. You might also have to claim and recheck your luggage between legs, if you are so risk-seeking as to check luggage.

2) If you book a codeshare (example US Air booked by United) make certain you get the record locator number for the US Air flight. You'll need to call US Air to reserve seats. It is also unlikely that you will be able to check in ahead of time and print your boarding pass with codeshares (in my experience).

3) Check your itineraries frequently. Cheaptickets.com and their ilk do not do it for you until you login to their systems.

4) Try to get each leg with each airline marked with your frequent flyer number for that airline. If you have done that you can check the originating airlines web site for the real status of the flight and check your seat assignments.

When does it make sense to book a multi-airline ticket? The easy answer is price - when you go down on one airline and come back on another airline you get the same level of service as you would if you worked with a single airline (depending on the variability of service and the I hate airline X attitudes), but airlines price each leg differently. It especially makes sense if you are tying to do 3+ city route where not all cities are equally served by a single airline.

Now, to book DCA->STT->MSY->DCA!

Cheers, RickG

Why do we say things like "in my experience?" Who's experience would it be?

I almost booked an out on USAir back on CO route for next May just to get the schedules I was looking for. But in the long run it was about $150-$200 more per person so I bagged it. It was an Orbitz deal. Glad to know though that you don't think there are any problems with that kinda thing. I was a little leary about it to tell you the truth.

Just did a Delta down American return last night for Thanksgiving. Found it on Hotwire then went to the airline site to do the booking on my own. $516 not great but I'll take that for Thanksgiving week. Real good times but had to do fri to fri. Gonna just miss everyone for that huge beach bar party.

Rick - I just came back and found this post after theshopper's post thanking you for it.

First, I LIKE that itinerary you are trying to book

Second, are you saying you look at one way tickets? If so, do you do that through the airlines or places like travelocity?

Rick,
Good advice. A couple of additions. Use CheapTickets and Orbitz, etc to shop only. (as you know, Orbitz is owned by a several of the airlines) Then often, if you go to the airline website directly, you will find the same fare. My advice is to always book directly on the airline website.

In these days and times, all airlines are shakey. If you book through a 2nd or 3rd party and the airline goes under, your refund maybe sketchy, if at all.

Most of you will notice that the airlines are automatically adding on travel insurance to your purchase. There is a reason for that! It's the survival of the fittest!

Choose to add the insurance on or not, or check with your credit card to see if you are covered if an airline goes under. It's your choice. If it were me I would purchase travel insurance, especially if purchasing way in advance.

Just purchased a cheap fare to SNA for next week and hoping Frontier is still around!!!

Sorry,one more thought....if you can check the "load" of a flight by calling the airlines it will help to know if the flight will actually even take off. They may or may not share this information with you. But if you know someone that works for that airline, they have a website they can check the "load" for you.

Currently, we've noticed that certain flights that are not full are being cancelled. That is a major headache. Airlines have just decided that if the planes not full, why bother, ...I think. Guess it's just not worth the fuel to fly at half staff.

Good points Terry. But, not all airlines will sell you itinerary that an orbitz or cheap tickets will. One I like is the JFK to STT direct flight at 8AM that gets you to STT before noon. I can get to JFK from DC with a 40 minute layover before that flight, which is essentially zero. Carryon only it is feasible. If you miss that then you get the next flight that gets you in at 2:30. American won't sell you that itinerary. A gambler might buy it from cheaptickets or orbitz.

If you Are REALLY shopping and obsessive you try all of the combinations:
- shop on kayak.com and orbitz.com
- check each leg as a one-way
- check the originating airline

Things get more interesting when you start booking open-jaw and 3-4 cities with stop overs.

Cheers, RickG

Rick???

What about my question???

You're right, Rick. One way tickets are the way to go these days. We have Southwest to thank for that pattern!

I remember 12 years ago when I sold travel, one way tickets cost a fortune and we did two round trip tickets (four segments!) for business travelers and it was much cheaper than one way tickets!

Southwest gambled with purchasing fuel on a negotiated contract out into the future. It's a risk, but in today's market, it has paid off for them.

Everyone will keep flying, just in a more creative way!

Does purchasing one way tickets guarantee that you will be strip searched even if you have two of them?

nothintolose,
Honestly, I don't think they have the time or the reason to search anyone that isn't a necessary search. I have pins, screws, titanium rod, and I have to go through the rig-a-maroll "strip search" every time and it doesn't take me very long at any airport and I'm in the air quite often.

But here is an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal today. I think we should be more concerned with cancelled flights than strip searching.

"Is your flight still a flight?"

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1215900 ... 67_leftbox

Okay - that link is scary. We are hoping to book between August and October (when rates are usually cheapest from here) for next summer. That article has me a little worried about booking that far out though.