Are Airfare prices really a mystery?

I am sure you have heard the term Early Bird Specials associated with booking holidays and in particular with flights. But how does the pricing work. I have no doubt that you have experienced looking for a price and thinking you will wait until it gets closer to the time to book, just in case the price drops only to look in a few days or months time to be sadly disappointed and find they are quite the opposite.

Gone are the days of waiting for a last minute deal to drop into your inbox. I have tried many ways to explain this to clients and have found simple analogies are the best. In a nutshell you have an overall cost of running the airline made up of the following:

• FUEL
• TAXES and GOVERNMENT CHARGES
• CATERING
• STAFF WAGES AND TRAINING (including overnight accommodations)
• UNIFORMS
• INSURANCES
• BRAND MAINTAINENCE
• ADVERTISING
• PLANE MAINTAINANCE and
• AIRPORT LEVIES

All of these items and more come at a price and someone has to pay. When looking at Economy Class, there can be as many as 14 booking classes all graded according to the cost of recovering the above items. So you could say that they are on a sliding scale. The cheapest booking class can be a T or an N or an S depending on the airline and these are what become available when a flight is opened for booking- hence Early Bird.
The airline knows that they need a number of seats sold in that class to get them to a certain point of debt recovery and once they have reached that, it is time to close that class and move upwards in price and start making more money. This process continues until all of the items I have mentioned have been "paid" for. Then it is time to start making money for the airline to use to again cover more costs of flying.
So if you think waiting is a good idea, maybe you should think again. Remember if you book on line you cannot hold a flight while you think about it. If you book through an agent who does all of the work for you, sometimes they can hold a flight for a few days depending on the fare. BUT, once a fare is booked you have to pay it in full by the ticketing time limit or the seats on hold for you go to the next waiting bidder.
My advice is to have the cash or card ready to go so that when you see a good price on a ticket you are in a position to grab it NOW instead of having to pay the more expensive fare at a later date.

It doesn't seem to matter who you talk to, if they have Flyer points undoubtedly there have been many times that they have tried to "cash" them in for flights only to be told that - and I quote- "I am terribly sorry but we do not have rewards points available on that flight". Ok fare enough so let's look at a day or two either side of the date required and we can work with that. Once again- "I am sorry but there are no rewards seats available for any class on any day in that week:.

So why do people still sign up for them in the hope of one day booking an economy seat and using their points to upgrade to Business Class. Now new rules say that you can no longer even do this. if you wish to upgrade using your points you simply -go into a draw- and if they email you, fabulous you can now use those hard earned points. However - and there is always a however- if you do not hear from the airline it is a case of too bad so sad.

But sign up they do. There are however little tricks of the trade that will allow you to use these points. If you have a good Travel Agent, she or he will be able to show you the way. That brings me to another subject, booking online yourself and having to deal with the frustrations and unknowns that Travel consultants have spent years learning about and researching. Oh dear yes that is right, they just don't sit behind a desk and fake their knowledge and expertise, they do know where the best spots are and the tricks that can save you money. But that is another story.