Welcome to International Flights
Airline Flight Article
This is a selection made from among articles on Airline Flight. For a permanent link to this article, or to bookmark it for future reading, click here.
from:
How to Save on Airfare with Open Jaw and Circle Trips
By Don Nadeau
Many airline and charter companies permit two types of airfares that can really save you money and time if you book them using the tips I’ll give you here. These airfares are “open jaw” tickets and “circle” tickets, also called open jaw and circle trips.
Never heard of them? Well, read on to learn what they are and how to use them. Circle fares and open jaw fares are especially useful when you want to visit more than one city, but want to avoid expensive one-way tickets.
OPEN JAW TRIPS
An open jaw trip is simply a three-city itinerary where the second and shortest segment is traveled on land. For example, a traveler from L.A. could:
• fly to Calgary,
• drive through the Canadian Rockies to Vancouver, and then
• fly from Vancouver back to L.A.
This takes less money than buying a roundtrip ticket from Los Angeles to Calgary and an expensive one-way ticket back from Vancouver to Calgary. It also takes less time than driving back to Calgary—and gives more time to enjoy Canada’s beautiful national parks.
HOW OPEN JAW TICKET PRICES ARE DETERMINED
The open jaw fare “averages out” two roundtrip fares. Let’s pursue the same example—our traveler wants to book a flight from Los Angeles to Calgary and then another flight from Vancouver to Los Angeles.
If the roundtrip fare from Los Angeles to Calgary costs $400, and the roundtrip fare from Los Angeles to Vancouver costs $350, our traveler would pay approximately $375 for her open jaw ticket. In other words, the open jaw ticket gives you the price of half of two roundtrip tickets.
(We’ll discuss how you set up an open jaw ticket later in this article.)
WHEN YOU CAN USE OPEN JAW TICKETS
Usually, open jaw tickets are permitted either solely within one country or from one country to one other country. For example, you could fly from Chicago to Durban, South Africa, drive to Cape Town, and then fly back to Chicago from Cape Town.
One exception to the “one other country” rule is that Europe is treated as one country. You can fly into Berlin and out of Copenhagen, into Rome and out of Amsterdam, or many other combinations.
The least expensive open jaw tickets are usually available only when these three conditions are met:
1) The flights must be on the same airline or its partners (e.g., KLM and Northwest).
2) The distance of the “open jaw,” or the segment traveled on land, usually must be shorter than either of the two flown segments.
3) The fares used for the two flown sections must conform to airline rules:
First, they must be combinable. For example, many Canadian and U.S. fares are not combinable with each other. Our traveler from Los Angeles might find it significantly more expensive to fly into Calgary and out of Seattle, instead of flying into Calgary and out of Vancouver.
Note that most discounted fares within one country are combinable.
Also, if fares rules differ, your ticket will follow the most restrictive one. For instance, if the roundtrip L.A. to Calgary fare allows a maximum stay of 30 days, but the roundtrip L.A. to Vancouver fare allows just 21 days, then the maximum stay permitted on your open jaw trip will be 21 days.
Knowing these rules can help you set up your itinerary in the least expensive way.
CIRCLE TRIPS
Circle fare tickets can also save you time and money. A circle trip is a multi-destination itinerary that involves flying between three cities, rather than traveling to any of them on land.
For example, you might fly out of Des Moines to Oakland, then fly from Oakland to San Diego, and finally fly back to Des Moines from San Diego.
To get the cheapest circle trip fare, your trip must follow the same conditions outlined for the open jaw ticket:
1) All flights must use the same airline or its partners,
2) The second trip of the three needs to be the shortest (except in a few cases), and
3) The fares must conform to the airline’s rules (see above for details).
COMBINING OPEN JAW AND CIRCLE TRIPS
You may be wondering by now if these two types of trips can be combined. Yes, they can. For example, you could fly from Boston to Phoenix, drive from Phoenix to Las Vegas, fly from Las Vegas to San Jose, and then fly back to Boston from San Jose.
And, if an airline like Southwest offers cheap one-way tickets on several of your intended routes, you can book even more creative and complex itineraries at low fares.
BOOKING THE LEAST EXPENSIVE CIRCLE OR OPEN JAW TRIP
Most online discount airfare sites offer an easy way to set up a circle and/or open jaw ticket. On most sites, such as Travelocity and Orbitz, you’ll choose the multi-destination or multi-city option.
Some sites may use different phasing. For example, on Expedia, you'll first click One-Way, and then choose multi-destination. And, although some sites like Hotwire do not offer multi-destination trips, they often have links to sites that do.
In addition, since you can’t use last-minute options such as Priceline’s “Name your own price” bidding for circle and open jaw trips, you will almost always get the best prices if you book your trip before the airline advanced purchase deadlines.
SO, bite into the open jaw fares or orbit with the circle fares—even combine the two—and SAVE TIME AND MONEY!
Don Nadeau, president of http://www.BidonTravel.com, loves helping people travel economically. He specializes in helping people find great last-minute airfares and hotel discounts.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Don_Nadeau
http://EzineArticles.com/?How-to-Save-on-Airfare-with-Open-Jaw-and-Circle-Trips&id=175237
Airline Flight Specific links
Airline Flight
- Looking for Airline Flight?
-- http://www.shopica.org/
Blinkx Video Search
- World's largest video search engine. Over 26 million hours of video.
-- http://www.blinkx.com/
Free Tech and Gadget Reviews!
- Watch GeekBrief With Cali Lewis on Mevio!
-- http://www.geekbrief.mevio.com/
Free tech talk and news video!
- Watch Tech5 with John C. Dvorak now!
-- http://www.tech5top5.mevio.com/
Connect at Current.com
- Stay current! All the Latest News and Videos: Entertainment, Politics, Sex, Tech, and Music. See whats new at Current.com.
-- http://www.current.com/
Airline Flight News
British Airways Thailand flight to arrive back in Britain - Daily Telegraph
A British Airways relief flight has picked up around 160 passengers from Phuket in the south of Thailand Photo: EPA British Airways said a relief flight carrying about 160 passengers would land at Heathrow airport. The airline sent an empty plane to ...
Read more...BA flies Thai tourists home - MSN UK News
More tourists stranded in Thailand are to arrive home on the first British Airways flight since anti-government protests closed the country's main international airport. British Airways said a relief flight carrying about 160 passengers would land at ...
Read more...Fighting for refund after airline changes schedule - Seattle Times
Q: After much work and desperation and reading your column faithfully, I have come to the conclusion that you are my only hope. A few months ago, just before my wedding, my fiance and his best man went to Las Vegas for his bachelor party. He had ...
Read more...Ask the pilot - Salon
Last week's column -- an open letter to the president-elect, outlining six things he should do to improve air travel -- drew about 50 letters to the editor. One of them came from a reader called "heyja." He (we'll assume it's a he) begins by agreeing ...
Read more...Battle to save Belfast Heathrow route - Belfast Telegraph
Northern Ireland’s Junior Minister will seek a meeting with the Irish Government to retain a vital flight route after it emerged Belfast could lose its Heathrow slot if Ryanair’s bid to buy rival airline Aer Lingus is successful. DUP MP Jeffrey ...
Read more...Etihad Airways launches flights to Almaty from Abu Dhabi - Times of Central Asia
ASTANA, Dec. 5 (CA-News) - Etihad Airways launched its first flight from Abu Dhabi to Kazakhstan commercial capital, Almaty, bringing to 50 the number of destinations served by the fast-growing national airline of the United Arab Emirates. Four ...
Read more...Engineering & Maintenance staff - Flight Global.com
International Air Cargo Company (LoadAir) is a newly air freighter airline based in Kuwait. Operation planned to start early 2009 with B747-400 ERF A/C. We are starting our recruitment for Engineering & Maintenance staff. Interested qualified ...
Read more...Joseph Adam Markowski, 102, retired flight engineer, dies - Chicago Tribune
At age 8, Joseph Adam Markowski helped his father clear farmland by lighting sticks of dynamite on tree stumps. During the Depression, he lost a finger working on an assembly line at the Florsheim Shoes factory in Chicago. Later, the Wisconsin native ...
Read more...Oman Air Resumes Operations To Suvarnabhumi Airport in Thailand - Zawya.com
Oman Air resumed its normal flights to Bangkok on Friday 5 December, as per the normal flight schedule. Oman Air had suspended its flights on Nov. 26 owing to the disorder that led to the closure of the two airports in the city. The Airline operated ...
Read more...Perak wants Sultan Azlan Shah airport to be reopened - New Straits Times
The Perak government will send an official request to the Transport Ministry for the Sultan Azlan Shah Airport to be reopened as promised by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. State Education, Local Government, Housing and Public ...
Read more...