Who do you book with?

[Fiona King]

Hi everyone, just wondering who you prefer to book your flights/trips with. I'm planning on travelling to Aberdeen, Scotland (my hometown) to visit family around Boxing Day for 3 weeks. We have booked holidays before through Expedia and had no problems but I got a quote from Flight Centre today and it seemed quite high ($2950) return. I know it is an expensive time of year to travel but wondering if you've found other sites/agents to do a better price than FC. I want to travel Qantas as I can continue onto Aberdeen from London and be allowed my 30kg luggage limit with British Airways as they are affiliated with Qantas. Thanks in advance for any suggestions

 

[Hvr]

Firstly welcome to AFF Fiona King.

Have you priced the flights with Qantas? If not it may be worth looking to see how they compare.

The other benefit is that if anything goes wrong you've a better chance of Qantas looking after you than Flight Centre (FC).

Oh and here on AFF we have a saying, friends don't let friends use FC.

 

[cambriamarsh]

Book QF direct, I've never found anyone cheaper for QF and Hvr's comment about help if needed is absolutely correct. Has anyone found anyone cheaper than direct, except maybe Expedia.br.

Btw does the .br still work?

Cheers

 

[markis10]

Book QF direct, I've never found anyone cheaper and Hvr's comment about help if needed is absolutely correct. Has anyone found anyone cheaper than direct, except maybe Expedia.br.

Btw does the .br still work?

Cheers

Plenty of airlines cheaper than QF, the OP should use a flight search engine to gauge who, such as skyscanner.net or kayak.com.au and then follow the links. Just stay away from anybody who is a lot cheaper than most of the others for the same pair of flights.

 

[cambriamarsh]

Plenty of airlines cheaper than QF, the OP should use a flight search engine to gauge who, such as skyscanner.net or kayak.com.au and then follow the links. Just stay away from anybody who is a lot cheaper than most of the others for the same pair of flights.

Sorry meant cheaper for QF, I agree there are plenty cheaper, not so sure about better AND cheaper tho.
Cheers

 

[ShaneN]

I have had a quick look at the Qantas website, which shows fares of around $2800 to $2900 at that time (and a fair bit more before Christmas). As noted above, if you want to fly Qantas it is best to book through the Qantas website. As Markis10 points out, there are a lot of cheaper airlines than Qantas. Check the various sites, note the prices, then have a look at the airline sites.

 

[Himeno]

I normally book with the airline direct. If their website won't do what I want, I go to a site like Expedia. If I can't get the internet to do what I want, I go to a travel agent.

 

[burmans]

I normally book with the airline direct. If their website won't do what I want, I go to a site like Expedia. If I can't get the internet to do what I want, I go to a travel agent.

I agree with the idea to use skyscanner or adioso to find the cheap flights but then book direct when you have identified the best option.

 

[harvyk]

If I want to do comparisons, I tend to use WebJet to do the actual comparison, but I'll then book directly with the airline. I have to admit, most of the time I'll simply book directly with QF, including any codeshare / flights on other carriers.

I would steer clear of Flight Centre. I've done quite a lot of bookings with them, but it helped that it was actually through a good mate of mine. There are some absolute gems who work for Flight Center, there are also some who just can't get a job in a real agency, and it's the luck of the draw, and let's just say once my mate left, I did exactly 1 more booking through them.

 

[Blinky]

I book through Flight Centre, but one of my son-in-lws is an Area Manager for them and if he wants to get continued free child care for his baby son, it's in his interests to look after me...

Seriously, though, I have tested him out on many occasions by getting "best" quotes on Expedia and the like. He always beats me because, unlike the average punter, Flight Centre works direct with wholesalers. On one occasion on a holiday to Bali, not only did he comfortably beat my hotel quote, but organised an upgrade to a suite.

The other obvious point is that if anything goes wrong with the booking, it's their problem, not yours.

So do your best, but it does't hurt getting a Travel Agent quote.

And welcome as well.

 

[knasty]

Do you definitely need 30kg vs 23kg? KLM and Air France are both coming in around $2250 for dates in your range.

 

[smithy]

As stated by others, I too go to Webjet site for comparison airfares and then book direct with the airline via internet. For example last year I was looking at j class airfare to Bali on Garuda using Webjet, then went to the Garuda website and they had flights on same dates for significantly less, it was a "promo fare". I saved over $1000 per person..

 

[Himeno]

I would steer clear of Flight Centre. I've done quite a lot of bookings with them, but it helped that it was actually through a good mate of mine. There are some absolute gems who work for Flight Center, there are also some who just can't get a job in a real agency, and it's the luck of the draw, and let's just say once my mate left, I did exactly 1 more booking through them.

When I needed to use an agent, I used to use Qantas Travel until they shut down. Then I went to Flight Center (better then some of the other travel agent options in North Canberra). It really depends on which agent you deal with. I've had some shocking agents and some really good ones.
The current agent I deal with is so popular that she only takes appointments.
Some of the others I've dealt with wouldn't know 1100 from 2300.

When I went to the nearest Flight Center branch last year to book a DAS13 and extra short flights for the connecting DONE3, she was quite surprised and impressed that I had everything (flights, availability, required fare classes, etc) all ready and she just had to enter them into their system and get the price.


There have been times when I've found better flights for my parents holidays then their agent has. A few years ago, before they found their current agent, they were on a RTW trip and were traveling DUB-JFK. Their agent wanted to send them back via AMS. Mum doesn't like flying and refuses to spend more then 8 hours in a plane at a time such that their trip last year to southern Europe routed CBR-MEL-KUL-DXB-FCO out and DXB-BKK-SYD on the way back with stops in DXB and south east Asia (until they started booking Business...), so you can imange her response to the agent when I looked up the airlines and available flights for their RTW and told them there was a non stop direct DUB-JFK flight valid for their RTW ticket.

 

[burmans]

If I want to do comparisons, I tend to use WebJet to do the actual comparison, but I'll then book directly with the airline. I have to admit, most of the time I'll simply book directly with QF, including any codeshare / flights on other carriers.

I would steer clear of Flight Centre. I've done quite a lot of bookings with them, but it helped that it was actually through a good mate of mine. There are some absolute gems who work for Flight Center, there are also some who just can't get a job in a real agency, and it's the luck of the draw, and let's just say once my mate left, I did exactly 1 more booking through them.

Webjet are good and indeed I use them but marginally prefer skyscanner and adioso because you can then direct to the real site directly, where Webjet make it a bit harder.

 

[burmans]

As stated by others, I too go to Webjet site for comparison airfares and then book direct with the airline via internet. For example last year I was looking at j class airfare to Bali on Garuda using Webjet, then went to the Garuda website and they had flights on same dates for significantly less, it was a "promo fare". I saved over $1000 per person..

This is a of course a problem, there is no one best site because sometimes some do have promos not available to others. Always worth checking more than one site!

 

[JohnK]

I generally book directly with Qantas.

Occasionally I have used Expedia if they have been cheaper or I wanted a specific routing I could not get on Qantas.

<off topic stuff>

 

[amaroo]

Settle on short list; price direct and then compare with the search engines mentioned upstream.

 

[alieninperth]

I normally check the itin on ITA matrix and then try and book direct. In this case, this itin Matrix - ITA Software (i'm really not sure if this will work) in any event. once I have the basic price, I'll then try and book with the airline (QR in this case) and then try the likes of expedia.

In this case QR are not showing these flights and skyscanner is showing similar flights (KLM is still cheaper).

 

[seanpodge]

I mainly use Kayak for all my non Chinese domestic flights to compare. Then I use the airline website to make the booking if possible.

 

[Fiona King]

Thank you all for your responses, feedback and welcomes it's much appreciated. I have done some researching and have decided to go with Emirates to DXB and LHR and then BA to Aberdeen. The connecting and return flights work out perfectly for me. I got a price through Expedia but will check with Emirates directly also.

Thanks again, this site is invaluable.