How to save on flights

Thanks Tammy for the reminder to check flights and fares after booking. You did great saving money.
Best I could find with United for my June/July trip was $50 savings but not great connection times. But I did get a $100 credit last year because of a problem with my reservation. It doesn't hurt of ask.

Love it! That's real money for dinners and rooftop tours and Flamenco shows!

Tammy, what exactly do you need to say to get the credit? Do they resist giving it to you? I’ve never done this before but checked and see it is about $200 less per person now. A flight credit is ok if it isn’t too much since we may not use a big amount within a year ( is that the usual time limit)

Tammy, that's awesome! What a great savings! Love flight ecredits; like having a vacation in the bank (almost literally).

Can you clarify for me: I've tracked my flights after-purchase in the past and never come across a better deal (sigh), but I always wondered about the process if I did. I assumed I'd have to cancel and rebook my flights online, and I've wondered if there's a risk to losing my selected seats (like, someone grabs them in between my cancel and rebook) -- which are usually very good, since I tend to purchase early.

But it sounds like you called and an agent took care of everything. Was it super simple? And you kept your seats?

On United, you can just change the flight online and the credit (or refund, depending on your fare) is automatic.

I just checked Google Flights for our multi-city itinerary next fall. British/American have some prices I find acceptable, cheaper than they were a few months ago.

Delta is still out of my comfort zone, although Google shows one Delta flight via Virgin Atlantic that might be possible...

The agent doesn't touch the reservation. They merely give you the credit, so everything, seats etc. stays the same. It just takes some time on hold and patience, but anyone can do this.
I think the ecredit is good for one year. I 've already spent mine on flights to Asia this fall. So yes, there is a time limit to use them.

Awesome, thanks!

I went online to check how to contact American Airlines and a “ chat” option was available. So I keep answering the automatic questions as “ something else” and after a few of those it asked if I wanted to talk to someone.. a real person came on the chat, I gave my confirmation number and asked for a credit. Five minutes later I got $140 pp and an email follow-up confirmation Thanks!!!
Follow-up:
I checked my AA account and it shows the credit ( different from air miles) and it has an expiration date of one year from now.

This is great news! Thanks so much for reminding people to check their flight prices.

Thanks for this reminder and explaining how easy it is to do it.

On the flip side you can check like I just did and see that it's more expensive now and feel good about it :-)

I think the ecredit is good for one year.

And you can technically extend the ecredit by booking and cancelling another flight. I've read about people extending an ecredit for years this way.

Great reminder to keep checking prices!

I just checked my British Airways itinerary for June and the price had not changed, but I did notice that seats in business class are very cheap right now (only about $1K more than economy). I was tempted, but decided to keep my economy seats. If any of you are ready to splurge. . . .

Not only should people periodically check the price of their airline ticket, but be sure to check your reservation and seat assignment. I've had my seats changed due to a change in plane, and I've had the flight dates and itinerary change due to cancellation, and was never notified.

We had the same thing happen to us regarding seat assignments. Apparently it is a different plane and sear configuration. I was just checking one weekend and we were able to get acceptable seats. Now I check every week.

If you set up Google Alerts for your booked flights, you'll will be notified of price changes. I keep my alerts on after we purchase flights, just as research for the next trip, and to confirm we bought at the best time! Hod luck!

Does this apply to the European airlines or just US based?

I believe this is for US airlines - I haven’t heard of any foreign carriers having the same policy.

One other thing to be aware of, don’t just check for price drops. The new policies makes it easy to switch flights or dates of travel and easily see what the price differential will be including between economy, premium plus, etc. I mainly fly United and their website is awesome - it allows one to play with dates, routings, etc. I once ended up paying an extra $20 to move from economy to premium plus for a Tokyo - Denver flight. Well worth it.

I had the same experience as Tammy with Delta flights in late 2023. It was very easy to get the ecredit-all I needed to share was my name and the booking number. Very easy to use the credits when booking flights for our next trip!

Recently I was on the phone with an Alaska Air agent to confirm changes on upcoming flights purchased with miles. She recommends checking flights monthly for any changes.

The airlines switched our plane again. It is back to 3 seats instead of the 4 it was from the first switch. They kept our seats together at least. And the flight price is now back to what we originally paid. The premium seat between us on the return flight is still empty so maybe we will get really lucky.

I'm was not necessarily saving money, because well, I was looking to spend on flights. But, man, talk about buying on the dip.

I prefer to fly United directly from IAD to Europe, home through IAD to RIC. I'm watching multi-city options in Premium Plus, looking for flights to BER and home from LHR. United's flights to BER depart from EWR, so I’m going to have to go RIC>EWR>BER.

Prices were sticking around $2,500, occasionally dipping to $2,200, but any itinerary through IAD was staying high and wasn't budging. Not what I wanted to pay. One morning I checked prices and one itinerary dropped to $1800 and I grabbed it right up. I ended up with an ideal flight out RIC>EWR>BER but home LHR>EWR>RIC.

The day after purchase, checking out of curiosity, prices were back up at $2,500, and any itinerary with flight home through IAD at $3,100 -- they are still sitting at those prices weeks later. Two days after ticket purchase I got a message from United that the departure time for my London flight had changed. I could accept or change the flight, and I could make that change to go through Dulles. Oh yes I did, LHR>IAD>RIC

So I ended up with the flights I wanted at a ideal dip in price. On a side note, economy tickets for the same flights have dropped over the last couple days from $1,300 to $1,200 to $900.

Be careful with the expiration dates on the e-credits. Just after covid times, they were allowing all kinds expiration date-extending shenanigans. You could book a trip and cancel and it would extend the date of the credit but, at least on Delta, that's no longer the case. You have one year from the date of the original booking to use the credit. In Tammy's original example, she would need to book her flight to use the e-credit no later than this June. It sounds like she's done that, but if she has to cancel for some reason after June, she'll lose the credit. Maybe other airlines aren't enforcing this but check before you assume!
That tip about checking for any changes the airline makes to your flights can be very valuable. On Delta, even small changes will often make your flight eligible for full cancellation with REFUND (not e-credit) or very generous changes to different airports, dates, etc. We usually buy tickets pretty far in advance and have gotten refunds on non-refundable flights by waiting out the time until they made a change in the schedule.