Korean Job Discussion Forums

[indramayu]

How have others fared with getting cheaper fares? Are offline OR online leave cheaper fares?

In my experience so far, I've done better online. How can that be? Doesn't the online & offline travel agents access the same info and search the same flights?

Thanks. In

[authoritar]

Hi,

I know a bit about this and infact you are almost right. They do have access to the same info but they promote it different. Each company is different, some prefer you to book online so they have special discounts or promotions online, some prefer you viist the store so they can give you the hard sell.

Secondly, the airlines for example distribute seats between each agent, some agents will get a higher allocation of cheaper economy seats while others will get the higher priced economy seats. Not every seat is priced the same as I am sure you know.

In my opinion, I would ditch the travel agents and search the airlines yourself.

http://teachorient.blogspot.com/

[indramayu]

Believe it or not, I compared the online travel agencies (expedia, travelocity) with the airlines themselves and found the agencies to be cheaper. In my case, it was Seoul-Chicago flights with United Air. There was a $200 difference / ticket. In both cases, this was pre-tax prices.

In your experience, flights straight from the airline's websites were cheaper. It mystifies me how my flights could have been cheaper.

However, I do notice that online travel agencies will state a too-low tax and then give the full tax at the last payment page. For example, all my flights this summer had $400 tax but the page showing comparing the different flights showed only $100 flight.

Im

[PeteJB]

Another thing to watch out: Korean Air's English and Korean website. The English version of the site quotes prices about 100 dollars higher than the Korean one.

[authoritar]

Agreeing with PeteJB, I have experienced that myself. I know a friend who books all his flights through Korean sites with the help of a Korean.



http://teachorient.blogspot.com/