It’s now or never for the last-minute traveler; experts see impending price increases
Midwest fares
Bestfares showed Des Moines, Iowa, to Atlanta flights for $285 per person for air and hotel this weekend.
Fares from Midwestern cities to the Northeast were 26 percent lower than last year, according to Harrell. Fares to the South were about 15 percent lower, while prices to Western destinations were flat.
Cleveland-to-New York fares have been cut in half. Chicago-to-Boston prices were 20 percent lower than the same time last year. Cleveland-to-Newark was down 34 percent.
But there are pockets that haven’t moved down. Detroit-to-Orlando fares, for example, were 9 percent higher than last year. Fares from Chicago to Las Vegas jumped 31 percent, Harrell said.
A ground crew member drives past the tail section of a Southwest Airlines plane at SeaTac Airport in SeaTac, Wash., in this June 11 photo. Air fares have been dropping all summer, but with July 4 fast approaching, some fares could be climbing again.
If you’ve been waiting for the lowest possible airfare for a trip this summer, it may be time to get off the fence.
Fares have dropped for months while travelers held off buying tickets because they were afraid of losing a job or worried about affording even a scaled-back vacation.
But with July 4th fast approaching and jet fuel prices rising, some fares could be set to climb again.
Rick Seaney, CEO of FareCompare.com, said it looks like airlines are trying to halt the fare slide, with recent hikes of $10 and $20 round-trip. Still, he wrote in an e-mail that the minor increases in the last two weeks “have by no means completely curtailed the flood of cheap airline” tickets from the first half of the year.
In fact, AirTran recently put out fares that hit new market lows on hundreds of routes, he wrote.
Memorial Day usually signals the end of the best time to book travel, but this year was different. With fewer people traveling, the sales continued.
A Travelocity survey shows fares down 17 percent for travel between Memorial Day weekend and Labor Day.
The travel Web site also says travelers are booking 86 days before departure instead of 90 days. That might not sound like a big deal, but Genevieve Shaw Brown, senior editor at the online travel Web site, said it takes lots of people booking later to move the needle that much.
Tom Parsons, CEO of discount travel Web site Bestfares.com, recommends making a top-10 list and checking fares until you find a bargain. Chances are some of your favorite spots will be on sale.
Take a closer look at travel Web sites, including the airline sites, that often throw in additional discounts if you enter a specific code usually found in a section for promotional fares. Airline Web sites also offer deals that include hotel and sometimes car rental.
Gabe Saglie, senior editor at travel information Web site Travelzoo, expects promotions to continue into the summer as people remain hesitant to book vacations far in advance.
“People are definitely becoming more impulse-driven,” he said.
If you still want to go somewhere before mid-August, Parsons says buy your tickets now. It’s unlikely the deals will get any better. After that it’s another story. Parsons says airlines haven’t started serious discounting for flights after mid-August, so you might want to wait to book tickets for then.
Parsons and other travel watchers have noticed that fare increases have eliminated ultra-cheap tickets to Europe between now and Aug. 17.
“It’s across the board, it’s like a disease,” Parsons said.
Fares out of any particular city are driven mostly by competition to a destination. For instance, Frontier, Southwest, and United were already competing vigorously in Denver before the recession. So fares there fell just 1 percent through June 1, according to Bob Harrell of airfare-tracking firm Harrell Associates.