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Guessing the lowest airfares"LOWEST AIRFARES" Can't find what you need? Try a Google Web Search in the box below!
05-12-2002 "Lowest Airfares On Travel Sites Turn Out to Be Anyone's Guess" Name-your-price travel agent Priceline.com announced one of the weirdest Internet sales yet last week: a "30-day airfare super sale," with fares "up to 50 percent or more" off the airlines' published retail prices. Huh? Isn't Priceline (www.priceline.com) already a deep discounter for the lowest airfares? Its booking system has long invited you to name your price and see if an airline will accept your binding bid. The whole point of this routine is to beat any sale price. It turns out that Priceline's half-off sale works just like the regular Priceline deal. You still can't see what prices are available, and you still have to offer a price for the lowest airfares and see if there are any takers. Can't find what you need? Try a Google Web Search in the box below!
But Priceline says the airlines will accept lower prices than usual to boost pre-summer travel. Trips must be booked by June 5 and completed before June 30 to qualify for the mysterious discounts. Priceline has gone off on a different tangent on eBay. There, Priceline, which has a partnership with eBay to strengthen that site's travel section (www.ebay.com/travel), offers a combination of fixed-price deals and a bidding system for the lowest airfares. You specify where and when you are going, your name, and your e-mail address, then either buy the trip at a preset price or bid a lower amount, subject to a listed minimum. On Priceline's eBay site, the "buy it now" price for a trip to San Francisco from Baltimore next month was $306. That was considerably more than the $216 lowest airfares available from rival Expedia (www.expedia.com). Can't find what you need? Try a Google Web Search in the box below!
Travelocity (www.travelocity.com), meanwhile, appears to be taking a page from Priceline's book. Its lowest airfares for the same trip was $290, but like Priceline, Travelocity revealed neither the airline nor the flight time. Travelocity popped up a box that said the airfare was good for only 30 minutes. It also said: "In order to keep prices low, the airline and flights are only revealed once your purchase is complete . . .. In order to offer such deep discounts, we cannot sell these airfares over the phone; they are only available on the Web." Travelocity also displayed regular airfares with times and carriers identified, starting at $386. It's nice that computer technology has made all this so much easier..... Compare the lowest airfares here /cheap airfares home |