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Viewing Ten Dynamite Ways to Fly Free (or Almost Free)Ten Dynamite Ways to Fly Free (or Almost Free)
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Do you love travel? Many people are hurting right now economically. If you are one, this information might enable you to take that much-desired trip or vacation. The tips in this article come from a professional travel agent with the inside scoop. By Debra Fortosis Do you love travel? If so, I hope you appreciate this. I am a professional travel agent with valuable information. I hope that at some future date you might repay me by booking your family vacation, tour, or luxury cruise on my site. So what are some ways to fly free or almost free? 1. If you or a family member begins working for an airline, in most cases your family can fly free on that airline, owing only for taxes. This is an almost priceless benefit if you and your family like to travel and have the time to do so. 2. You can win airline tickets in sweepstakes. I admit, the odds are not great. However, it is becoming quite common for companies to offer free airline tickets when you buy some service or big-ticket item. Keep a lookout for such offers. Two airline tickets anywhere in the continental U.S. can be worth up to $300-500. There are also occasional buy one/get one deals. 3. If you are not flying on a tight deadline, overbooking/thank you vouchers can be very nice. Overbooking of flights means that the airline asks if anyone would agree to take a later flight. For this favor, the airline gives you a voucher, sometimes for a full airline flight in the future. Be prepared for such cases, because when the offer comes, you usually are on the jet and you do not have time to consider it. Last minute/standby deals are not as common as they used to be, but occasionally they still happen. This means you just show up at the airport and request that if someone misses the flight in question, you would like his or her seat at a discounted price. Of course, check in advance and confirm whether the airline accepts this practice and if there is any discount. 4. Almost everyone seems to know about frequent flyer miles. If you fly often, you can earn bonus points toward a free airline ticket every time you fly with a particular airline. There are also many credit cards that issue you miles/points for every purchase you make using the card. Gold and platinum cards, especially, offer lots of bonus miles in exchange for use of the cards. 5. New airlines often reduce fares drastically, or an airline reduces fares when adding a new route/destination. Also be aware that you can sometimes reap large discounts by flying during the slowest days of the week or the slowest times of the year, flying to popular destinations at unpopular times, purchasing during the cheapest times of the day, or buying a super cheap travel package, though you cannot use it at that moment. 6. Consolidators buy blocks of tickets in bulk at near-wholesale prices. This means that they can offer you highly discounted airline tickets. Some consolidation prices are better than others. We are not talking dirt-cheap here, maybe $100-150 off a $500-$600 ticket. However, savings are savings, right? 7. If you hire on as a courier, you can fly cheap, sometimes free. A courier escorts a package to its destination. Companies do this to avoid delays getting packages through customs. If you are at least 18 years of age, would like to travel the world, are willing to go with two small carry-on bags, can travel alone, and you have an adventurous spirit, this could be your dream come true. You can usually work it out so you spend a week or more at the destination before traveling home. One of the best deals I ever came across was Los Angeles to Tokyo for $100 in taxes. The ticket normally would have cost about $1800. 8. If you are a writer and like writing about new places, you can fly free if you are hired to write about it for some sort of travel periodical. Some people have turned their love for travel into a very lucrative writing career. This is rare, because even good writers can rarely entertain so well that readers will buy book-length copies of their travel experiences and perspectives. If you are interested, though, you can find out more about this by Googling "become a travel writer". I would also suggest that you begin gradually building a reputation as a travel writer by getting published by magazines or, even easier, by ezines. You may eventually have enough notoriety to merit an offer here or there as a paid travel writer. 9. Some U.S. carriers offer discounts for individuals over 50 years of age; others offer them for those 62 or older. You can also buy senior-discount coupons in books of four. These coupons can sometime enable senior travelers to save almost half off a full-priced airline ticket. 10. Flying charter flights can save money but this is not one of my favorite options. Charter flights are scheduled less often than domestic flights and they book to complete capacity. This is definitely no frills - you are packed in so tight, there is little room to move. If there is any food on a longer flight, it will be a very simple brown bag. The only exception is if you are lucky enough to book first class. Then you are getting first class service at a coach fare price. I found a few other ways to save money on flights, but I did not consider them worth telling. Many people are hurting right now economically; if you are one, I hope this information might enable you to take that trip or vacation you really want to take. Good luck! About the Author: Debra Fortosis loves travel and is an experienced travel agent. You can easily book discount travel on her website. She can even get you going with your own start-up travel business for an unbelievable price. Article source: 111 Travel Directory: Triple1.com (triple one dot com) More free articles: 1st Rate Articles - 1stRateArticles.com |
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