Not Directly Negril Related, but Certainly Relevant! Flight Research

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/when-i...181159230.html

Bargain-conscious travelers have been trying to answer the question for years and are still stymied: How far in advance do you have to book to get the best airfare?

According to new research by CheapAir.com based on the travel site's review of 560 million airfares, the optimal time to book a domestic flight is 49 days in advance. If you're flying overseas, you should book almost three months -- 81 days, to be precise -- before you travel.

Too much planning for you? Don't worry. While the average domestic flight was the cheapest 49 days out, it didn't start to rise dramatically in price until about two weeks before the departure date. But if you wait until the day or two before you want to travel, get ready for some serious pocketbook pain. Domestic flights that would normally cost less than $400 jump to about $625.

Notably, it's also bad for your pocketbook to book too far in advance, according to CheapAir. People who booked 210 days before the flight ended up paying an average of $475 for a domestic ticket. There are exceptions and caveats, however. If you're booking for a high-traffic time, like Thanksgiving, it can make sense to book well in advance. The optimal time to buy a flight for Thanksgiving weekend in 2012, for instance, was 96 days in advance.

If you're taking an international flight, by contrast, you might score a real bargain by being spontaneous. For example, the best price CheapAir found for a Los Angeles-to-Tokyo flight was when the traveler booked one day before the flight.

Other factoids of note: Booking a flight on a Tuesday or Wednesday is not likely to save any money. But flying on a Tuesday or Wednesday will.

And, of course, while this study focuses on average ticket prices, there are a lot of one-time deals that can make booking at any given time either a bargain or a bust. CheapAir tries to deal with the frustrations of variable airline pricing by offering a customer payback program. If you book a flight through the site and find that your specific itinerary has dropped in price, it offers you up to a $100 credit for another flight. And what if another airline offers a better deal in the meantime? Unless you're traveling on one of the rare airlines, such as Southwest, that will allow you to change your ticket without penalty, you're out of luck.

Yeah,it's nice to fly on a Tuesday or Wednesday but you may have less options and more stopover flights. I read that flight sales may come up at 1am or 2am....

I use an online matrix site that a group of MIT computer scientists came up with in the 90's. It's free and it is always spot on with the prices. You can't book directly on the site, you just call or go online with the airline or your travel agent with the information and book your flights. You can use a numer of search functions and search over a number of days at a time. I use it everytime I travel now. If Rob will allow me to post the link I will....like I said it's free to use.

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Originally Posted by Fred Stripe

Yeah,it's nice to fly on a Tuesday or Wednesday but you may have less options and more stopover flights. I read that flight sales may come up at 1am or 2am....

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We usually fly on a Tuesday or Wednesday because not only do the flights tend to be cheaper, but the airports are less crowded. US Air always has daily non-stop flights from Philly to MBJ, so that is not an issue. The only downside is that this forces me to use an extra vacation day (if we stay from Saturday to Satuday, then I need to take 5 vacation days - If we stay from Wednesday to Wednesday, then I need to take 6).

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Originally Posted by butch

I use an online matrix site that a group of MIT computer scientists came up with in the 90's. It's free and it is always spot on with the prices. You can't book directly on the site, you just call or go online with the airline or your travel agent with the information and book your flights. You can use a numer of search functions and search over a number of days at a time. I use it everytime I travel now. If Rob will allow me to post the link I will....like I said it's free to use.

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Would love to know this link ... the easier to book a flight, the easier to get to Negril

I'll PM it to you gerry...for instance I just found a flight for my friend recently from dayton to lax for $250! Not bad huh?
(sent it through site email since your PM is locked....I hope it helps you out)

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Originally Posted by butch

I use an online matrix site that a group of MIT computer scientists came up with in the 90's. It's free and it is always spot on with the prices. You can't book directly on the site, you just call or go online with the airline or your travel agent with the information and book your flights. You can use a numer of search functions and search over a number of days at a time. I use it everytime I travel now. If Rob will allow me to post the link I will....like I said it's free to use.

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Please share.. i'm always on the hunt for good fares..

Want.

Check my "got it booked" thread

I'd like that link, also please!

It's not a link it's a program. It would be very hard for a non programer to run it.

Sorry

The link to the site is http://matrix.itasoftware.com/

The automation for the search is the program

Captain....thats it! Link/Program whatever you want to call it....it's stil pretty cool. I wasn't sure about posting outside "programs" on the board, didn't want to break any rules or anything. Anyway.....everyone should check it out, its pretty easy to use and I hope it saves everyone on the board more money so we all can go back to Negril more often!

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Originally Posted by butch

Captain....thats it! Link/Program whatever you want to call it....it's stil pretty cool. I wasn't sure about posting outside "programs" on the board, didn't want to break any rules or anything. Anyway.....everyone should check it out, its pretty easy to use and I hope it saves everyone on the board more money so we all can go back to Negril more often!

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The programing part was writing code that would check it every 3 hrs 24/7 until it found what I was looking for and send me an alert.

I won't post that.

ok

Matrix is the only site I use as it has every flight and every possibility..I click on " calender of fares" setting rather than the "specific dates" setting to see the best deals..Tuesday and Wednesday seem to be the cheapest days to fly..hundreds less than the weekends