Nick;

When you are on the web looking at airline ticket prices you are working with the Airline or a third party. As I understand it third parties get different rates from Airlines, so one may be better than another. In fact often I see third party rates less than the Airline web prices.

Not long ago I would call my travel agent and he would find the best price. My travel agent is no longer in business – another causality of the Internet. Now I get to look for the best price and it is one step from hell I think.

Amazing how much progress we have made because of the Internet! :)

Tom


>Tom
>
>I was also struck by how poorly some of the internet sites functioned. I was trying different dates and at one point almost ordered a ticket before noticing the site had used a departure date from one query and a return date from a later query.
>Presumably these sites are all basically using the same input data (flights fares etc) by the vendors so how can they all come up with varying fares.
>
>Nick Mason
>
>ct
>>
>>This sounds like our experience also. Using the web, you can sometimes find a great deal for a flight from San Jose to Los Angeles, perhaps $29 on occasion. Most of the time I can only find $395, which flies from San Jose to Phoenix, Arizona, to Los Angeles. Absurd!
>>
>>Calling the Airlines is a terrible experience. They will charge you more than the stated web price, cannot speak English that can be understood and do not care.
>>
>>Tom
>>
>>>Just I minor rant.
>>>
>>>I've recently been trying to book a flight to Charlotte (North Carolina) from Gatwick. Using a variety of on line sites to check fares and availability. What a mess of conflicting information I get. Different prices (varying by a huge amount) and availability
>>> where do these web sites get their base information ? How can you be sure you get the best result in the end ?
>>>
>>>To cap it all I tried ringing USAirways directly and was quoted a fare £50.00 dearer than the one I was looking at on their web site as I spoke to the lady. Also I suspect she may have been operating from a call centre because her English was quite poor which really put me off enquiring any further with her.
>>>
>>>So there it is, the modern world, I can't find out a definitive price for something or if its even available.
>>>
>>>Nick Mason