Do flights get cheaper?!

Catwin

We are going to India for three weeks in Feb 2010. We had the idea a few weeks ago, and only found out today that we can definitely go. I think there were cheaper flights around a few weeks ago. Should we get what we can now, or is it worth waiting a few weeks in case anything cheaper comes up?
We will be travelling from England. As we are going with young children, we would rather get a direct flight.

Also, any suggestions for places to stay with children in Goa?

Thanks, Catherine.

machadinha

If I knew, I'd be getting rich off it

Prices have been widely fluctuating where I am (The Netherlands) of late on a daily basis, however the mean average seems to hover around E 500 return still at the lowest end (with none of the most budget of companies, btw), that's good enough for me.

If UK is markedly more expensive, consider looking into e.g. Brussels or some other cheaper continental airports (e.g., Germany, France, Switzerland). Could be worth it, even including getting there. (Prices will depend on local airport taxes levied on the companies, which is why some of those are far cheaper to fly from.) A decent travel agent should look into this for you anyway.

Wanting to fly in the holiday season will normally get prices up, but this doesn't seem to apply to you. I'm currently looking at going for two months in early Jan.; checking on leaving later in Jan., so avoiding any tail end of the holiday season, I come up with higher, not lower, prices. Don't know why that is.

It's always a gamble of course; best to stop looking at airfares as soon as you're booked, you'll be guaranteed to find a cheaper deal

(I was recently speaking to some friends who thought if the swine flu really breaks this winter, prices will be guaranteed to tumble. That could be worth a gamble; but it will be a real gamble, indeed. Prices have been really low since this current crisis; they might pick up again any moment.)

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dominoes

Direct flights are more expensive.
Currently cheapest flights in Feb - are with Gulf at £312 LHR-BOM.
direct on BA is £70 more.
You've just missed a whole slew of sales but there should be others around Xmas.

This year I paid £294 in Jan for a return to Del in Feb on Air France- you can expect similar offers although BA,Jet. and Kingfisher (all direct flights) aren't as generous.

I don't know about Air India , but it has a very poor reputation on this route.

If you're going to Goa -the only direct flights are charters by Thomson etc- they charge heavily.

Good luck

Nick-H

As a general rule, in my limited experience (mostly of one route, but my booking pattern has varied between booked 6 months in advance and getting on the next available plane)...

flights are cheapest booked a long time in advance, except that top-peak-time (eg Christmas) travel never gets much cheaper.

flights are most expensive booked close to the time of flying unless the airline suddenly finds itself with a heap of empty seats, then it's special-offer Bonanza time! Last time I gambled on this one, I lost out badly.

direct flights are not necessarily the most expensive. This used to be true of the Heathrow/Chennai route, but in recent years the direct option (BA) has also been the cheapest whenever I've looked. This might not apply for other destinations.

Haylo

Just a heads up to anyone thinking of booking BA, they're rumbling about strike action again.

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Nick-H

I saw something about 1700 jobs to go, so I'm not surprised.

machadinha

One of the companies that keeps coming up with attractive flights for me. Hmm... Any prognoses for early Jan.? (Delayed return flight I care much less about )

wat

What would children do in goa?

Sama

international flight fares are a crap shoot. they literally change by the hour depending on how many seats are sold, etc.

I've spent the last six months sourcing fares from US to India to Africa and it's been a game of chance. the fares have ranged from $1000-$2000 more and less, literally.

and take the advice given about once you book a flight don't search anymore, because you will ALWAYS find a cheaper price AFTER you book!

by the way, it's always cheaper to fly on tues-wed-thursday. switching your days can save you hundreds of dollars or euros or whatever!

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Matthew Morris

With the weak pound UK is definitely cheaper to fly from than mainland Western Europe.

We just bought flights with Finnair flying from London and you get the free option to spend 24 hours in Helsinki, we went for that, as have never been there before.

http://www.cheapflights.co.uk is pretty good for checking out the cheapest flights.

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machadinha

Frolic about on the beach? Marvel at tropical environment etc.?

Thanks, that is in fact attractive. Will keep it in mind. (Flew to India earlier this year over Brussels-London btw. Price-wise it wouldn't have mattered much in which of the two I'd have boarded I think.

It seems that now there are decent deals from A'dam even for some reason, at the same rate or certainly when taking travel costs to/from Brussels into account. Don't know why they've suddenly dropped; Schiphol was markedly more expensive before to fly from, because of taxes again.)

Nick-H

They could sing...

Only... 24 hours from Helsinki
Only... One day away from your arms...

Matthew Morris

Yeah I agree, quite surprised by the number of cheap flights from Netherlands, around 500 euros I think I have seen quite regularly.

I'm flying from the UK as my friend didn't want to arrive in India by herself, but I get to see some mates in UK I haven't seen in a while, so no worries.

Actually was noticing a few flights around June-September for around 390 euros from AMS-DEL...am thinking of doing a trip to either Leh or valley of flowers areas for a short 2-3 week trip next summer.

Was just watching that BBC series Ganges, and the Valley of flowers area looks awesome.

nycank

Are your children going to be off in Feb ? Given vast amount of data mining going on; it is very unlikely that there will be a massive sale in December. However, it is entirely possible once the Airlines get real numbers for holiday loads.

In the US-India sector in general, Dec 15th-Jan26 (+/- 2 days) is considered peak season because of College and K-12 breaks. If patterns in UK are different, the airlines might price it differently.

Each airline has multiple fare basis. Each fare basis has a fixed amounts of seats allocated, and its own restrictions. Some fare basis are left to marketing folks, who then advertise cheap deals with lots of restrictions and limited number of seats.

I have no clue about charter airlines; but regular scheduled airlines tend to have their fares loaded.

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nycank

Airport surcharges, Landing Fees have been changed. Schiphol is not an airport, its a shopping Mall masquerading as one

It depends. If you list all the airlines from US/Europe flying into BOM/DEL airports, and start looking at their load averages, you can get a good idea of which airline is likely to tinker with their pricing for the coming quarter. With the Delta/NorthWestern merger, SkyTeam had all their majors flying into Mumbai; it forced DL to reduce capacity into BOM, and compete aggressively on NW coded flights. Making NorthWest and Continental very price competitive from some of the major markets of US.