Major carriers such as Delta, American Airlines and United Airlines have pitched the need to buy a roundtrip with them to get the best-priced fare. Since low-cost carriers have been promoting their airfares as one-way, the bigger carriers have had to follow in their footsteps. Here’s how you can get the best airline tickets for your domestic travels.
Buying Separate One-way Tickets Is The Way To Go
Many airline customers have been conditioned to buy bundled roundtrip tickets. If you break this habit, you may be able to find more flexible flight options and savings by piecing together one-way tickets. While this may not be the ideal way to purchase your airline tickets, it can allow you to save on flights and give you more flexibility on how and when you choose to fly.
More Airports, More Options
People living in or near metropolitan areas that have two or more airports can use the split ticket method to their advantage. Cities like New York, Dallas and Chicago provide multiple options for people to choose from, when booking separate one-way tickets. Find a cheap flight on Southwest out of Chicago — Midway on a Friday night, then look at one-way returns to Chicago — O’Hare and see if you can get a deal on United or JetBlue.
With split-ticketing, you’ll have the ability to fly from neighboring airports on the same trip and it will give you more choice in airlines, preferred travel times and cheaper airfares.
Avoid Extensive Change Fees
If you’re locked into a roundtrip booking, you’ll most likely end up paying a huge fee if you end up having to cancel or move your departure date up a day or two. With bigger airlines like Delta, American Airlines and United Airlines , you could be paying up to $200 on a change fee. Buying separate one-way tickets can help with this situation.
If you buy a one-way ticket for your return flight, you can leave it be and not worry about bumping that departure flight up a few days. This way, canceling doesn’t sting as much and you’ll avoid paying a steep fee on top of the price differential. Just rebook a new one-way departure and you’ll most likely save in the long run because the average one-way flight might not cost as much as the $200 change fee.
How Much Of A Hassle Will It Be?
It may take a few more steps than usual to find out which airlines are offering the best prices on particular days, but it can have many benefits. You’ll have to put the work in, but it may be worth it in the end if you are determined to get a deal. Websites like Google Flights and Kayak can help with some of the work by displaying a “separate tickets” tag.
Beware though; sometimes search sites will show ultra-low-cost carriers into many of their results, showing fees that seem too good to be true. Most of the time, they are too good to be true, as they’ll have hidden fees and so on.
Just by spending a little more time researching your next flight, you could save hundreds of dollars on flight bookings for yourself or your family.