Has anyone gotten airline emails announcing fall sales yet? I got one from SAS last week, but they no longer fly from Seattle so that doesn't help me; I haven't received any others (esp. Air France, who I really want!). I know I get lots of offers for fall travel every year but I can't remember when they start coming. I'm planning to travel during early October and am getting antsy, and it's only 3 months out so I'm wondering where the offers are.
I haven't gotten any either, but I suggest you set up an account on kayak.com (or similar) and sign up for their airfare alerts. You can get them daily, or weekly, or when the price drops below a certain $ amount.
We were able to get a flight to Florence for $530 from Baltimore, Delta failed to put the fuel surcharge one morning, the same flight was $635 later in the day.
Christy, go to the trouble of checking the Air France website every day; the alerts are not really reliable. Some of us have found that the really low fares may appear for a half day, then disappear.
Interesting. I did check the Air France site and lo and behold they are advertising Sept and Oct sale fares. They send me innumerable emails this winter and spring advertising spring and summer deals--I wonder if I got off their list somehow. But anyway, they aren't great deals. There were much better fares for spring and even summer. Hmm.
We got a really good price on Air France this spring via the airfare site associated with Auto Europe. They don't actually show you the airline on the AE site, but if you know the AF schedule, you can figure out which one of their discount flights it is. We were checking Air France pretty regularly, too, since they have the only direct flights to Paris from Boston, and never saw a fare as low as what we got via Auto Europe.
I just got this Kayak - SAS Notice about a Scandinavian Airways fall sale to Europe. We are already booked, and I try to make a habit on NOT checking fares after booking, because it often depresses me, so I don't know how good the fares are.
Interesting article in the Wall Street Journal about fares right now...
From the WSJ:
quote:
Through late May, sales were almost continuous, according to Mr. Seaney, and some were extreme. Summertime round-trips to Europe were priced close to $500 in several markets, at least half the cost of the same ticket during the summer of 2008
He goes on to say that that's over for summer, and that fares are rising rapidly. But for fall...
quote:
Mr. Harrell thinks consumers should wait if looking for post-Labor Day travel—unless they are looking at holiday travel or very popular destinations. Traditional fall sales may kick in and continued economic weakness could erase the increased demand airlines have seen this summer. “If I were planning to travel this summer, I would buy now,’’ he said. “But for fall, I would wait. Right now, airlines are just throwing fall prices against the wall and waiting to see what sticks. There’s still a lot of time left later this summer for panic.’’
Finally Air France sends a sale announcement, but it's not a very good sale. Nothing like spring and summer. I can fly nonstop from Sea-CDG for $902-$989 on my preferred days. Maybe that isn't awful.
