Online ticket prices

[etrang]

I organise most of my own travel and usually book online. I find sites such as Expedia, ect. offer good value for hotels and rental cars, but airline ticket prices are a different matter. The internet sites seem to simply enter your travel details into the different airlines own ticketing engines and consolidate those results.

But the best offers are usually not found on the airline website ticket engine, and often you get the equivalent of the hotel "rack rate" price - the standard full fare, or standard restricted ticket prices. Real travel agents (not internet) seem to have much better offers.

Are there any internet sites on which you can find the best offers, either booking sites or bessage board/discussion sites? I'm mainly interested in long-haul in J or F. Any suggestions or help appreciated.

[muggins]

all the price comparison sites do this, with a technique called 'scraping', where they use your details to fill in the various forms, and then extract the pricing etc from the returned pages.

I dont klnow of any site htat does what you are looking for, so you have to ask yourself is the convenience of a one-stop price comparison shop worth the savings/costs of phoning round yourself?

[Ancient Observer]

I disagree.

Virgin's website says that it is the cheapest place on the web to buy their tickets.

That just is NOT true. It's a straightforward lie - they just do not expect to be challenged.

I bought Virgin tickets thru Opodo much cheaper than the Virgin site had them for.

Like all things, you have to keep looking, and be creative. For instance, try departing from CDG or other European capitals rather than lhr.

[ulxima]

you have to keep looking, and be creative


Absolutely!
The web is plenty of areas where you can get ideas and if you travel frequently then you have the opportunity to challenge them.
Sometime you get the lowest available fare with he best flight combinations.
Sometime you get the best compromise.
Sometime you give priority to something else.
Whatever you try, if you do it regularly, you will always stay very close to the best and often you get the best available.
Eight years of online booking proved me this. Among the organization whom I am working for I am the only one allowed to book my trips online by myself. Very often my friends and colleagues ask me before planning any trip.
In six years no Travel Agency found a better deal (just able to match me in three occasions).

About being creative: I would say this is a must.

Start from the link below
Cheap Flights | Business Travel ? Bizclass Travel Market (http://www.bizclasstravelmarket.com/?gclid=CLPjob20s44CFQ_llAodYg6Ozw)

and do some simulations, just to get used to. It is easier than you can imagine.

Ciao
Ulxima

[man friday]

Cheap flights: compare prices, find airline tickets - Skyscanner (http://www.skyscanner.net/)
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[IamPAX]

Here are my two cents.

* Travelsupermarket.com (depart from UK)
travelsupermarket.com - the travel comparison site (http://www.travelsupermarket.com)

* Ticketstoworld.com
Tickets To World Cheap Flight Tickets, Affordable Flights Tickets, Economy/Business Class Airline Tickets (http://www.ticketstoworld.com)

* Melookyoubook.co.uk (for a 20 GBP fee they do the searching for you! Please read the conditions)
Melookyoubook | Outsource your flight search (http://www.melookyoubook.co.uk)

* Kayak.com
Cheap Flights, Airline Tickets, Hotels, Travel Deals - Search Data from 100's of Travel Sites at KAYAK (http://www.kayak.com)