- How to Book a Cheap Flight with the Best Tools for the Job [Travel]
When it's time to book a plane ticket, you've got an overwhelming number of online destinations to check—which really complicates things. NYT writer Matt Gross details his simple booking workflow, which combines his favorite travel sites for great deals.Photo by lrargerich.
You've probably heard of most of the services he uses (we've mentioned most of them here, in fact), but his process of moving from one site to the next—and his reasons for doing so—are what makes his guide interesting. Like most of us he starts at the Lifehacker favorite, Kayak, to get a baseline for prices. Next, he continues down the booking rabbit hole into more interesting and esoteric sites to verify ticket prices, see if he can find anything cheaper, and determine if he might save some money if he waits a little longer. For example:
So, I check out another site: cFares.com, which has a twist. For a $50 annual membership, you'll get small rebates if you book through them. Each rebate may be only $8 or $20, but if you fly several times a year, that can add up quickly. And last spring, cFares found me a flight from New York to Paris for $543.17, or about $200 less than any other search engine found.
His article covers his varying methods for domestic and international flights, and it's got some great tips for finding good deals without spending every waking minute searching every travel site you can find. Got your own tried-and-true methods for finding a great deal on a ticket? Let's hear it in the comments.
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