Jill was excited about this vacation and it’s been three years since she sashayed down the streets of Puerto Rico. Tanning, beach BBQs, cocktail parties, dancing the nights away are all things of the past. A two year grind! Besides the erratic weekend get-togethers with friends, there was hardly anything she can call FUN. Perhaps, this is the situation with most of us. Planning a vacation is like building castles in the sky! We hardly save enough when we’re on a fixed budget.
After much deliberation, she finally decided to give it a whirl to her fancies. Not a catch-22, though, but she thought “It’s now or never”! And these are times when you are more vulnerable to mistakes. Jill was not infallible!
She called up her travel agent and asked them to book a package vacation to Zurich. Ah, the breathtaking the Swiss Alps! You’ll keep pondering, yet never know that Jill’s IDEAL ski getaway was actually a tourist trap. She ended up paying almost double the actual cost, without any upgrades or special discounts.
During the flight, she could have easily gained an upgrade, given the miles she had accrued in Star Alliance’s Miles and More frequent fliers program. But her agent booked an airline, which is not a Star Alliance partner. What a lost opportunity!
Jill’s first mistake was that she did it all in haste. When budget travel requires planning well in advance, scouring for the cheapest plane ticket, searching for discount accommodation, cheap rent-a-car et al, can we afford to zip off simply by calling a travel agent?
Any discerning traveler, today, would prefer a travel website over an agent. One of the advantages of the World Wide Web! Keep combing for the best deals; compare each website and calculate all pros and cons. Never book in a hurry.
When you have time, you can always book in advance and grab the lowest airfare. So why wait till the last few days and pay top dollar? Okay, you want to snatch a last minute deal. Here’s what you need NOT do in any case. Don’t book during the peak travel time; i.e. Fridays, Sunday evenings, Monday mornings, the day before and after a holiday, and mid-day flights. Jill’s agent had her scurry on a Friday evening flight!
Also, don’t book another air flight when you have flier miles accrued in your regular airline or its allies. This means, if you’re regularly using the Star Alliance partner airlines, ideally, you shouldn’t change over to Oneworld or Sky Team. Changing to a different alliance will deprive you of the upgrades and benefits which you may earn from the frequent fliers program. Thus, while Jill could have opted for a Swiss Airlines flight to Zurich, her agent booked British Airways. Swiss Airlines is a member of Star Alliance, which she uses quite frequently for all her domestic trips. But British Airways has code sharing with Oneworld members. Hence, this time, she couldn’t use her flier miles.
Planning can earn you incredible benefits. So why not learn from Jill’s mistake?
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