There are two sites that I love that I think readers should follow:
- Extreme Hotel Deals. They consistently find extremely cheap hotel deals, I always like to keep an eye on the site and sometimes I can book things for trips I already have planned or take a vacation I didn’t expect to because of a crazy deal. For the newest deals go here. Although signing up for the e-mail might be a better option.
- The Flight Deal. Basically the same thing as above but for flights. It’s crazy how many other ‘flight deal’ sites just steal content from The Flight Deal without attribution.
Both sites often show error fares/rates, because of that after booking something I always consider it ‘unconfirmed’ in that the flight/hotel can be cancelled. Usually if it’s been more than a week or two then you booking is safe if it hasn’t been cancelled, although I’d say hotels are more likely to cancel later than airlines. What are your must follow/use travel sites?
It seems EHD recently requires “sign-in” and they stopped posting since late April?
RE: Flight Deals. Actually, I am pretty happy with my own searches with Google Flights.
My next trip: TPA-BNA $57 RT.
Yes, I had to buy $20 a bag fee at booking. But, even with AA partly matching some fares in that market, with my free bag on Aviator, it still did not compare well.
Anyway, with the BOA TR redemption, I have 11 months to cover the entire cost of $97. And, I get to try a “new” to me airline. Also, best advice, find your fare elsewhere away from the airline website, but book with the airline site direct. Trust me, as you hear an agent tell a passenger they can’t be helped because they booked third party during irr ops, one will consider the extra time invested quite worth it.
Happy Travels!
Is The Flight Deal better than Scott’s Cheap Flights?
Franke has a good track record, but lately he’s done things that seem bizarre. It hasn’t gotten much attention in the USA, but last year he started a new low cost domestic Chilean airline called JetSmart. The LAST thing Chile seemed to need was another airline. LATAM and Sky were already locked in a battle as to who could offer the cheapest domestic airfares humanly possible. In the USA, if you want to fly for $20 or $30, it’s relatively hard: you have to hunt for a sale on Franke’s Frontier Airlines, type in a promo code, and fly on a very off-peak day. In Chile, it’s easy to fly for 30 bucks, and has been for some time. I don’t even think there’s much intercity bus transport in Chile anymore, because it’s too expensive to travel by bus compared to flying! JetSmart seemed as smart an idea as, say, launching a new Icelandic low fare airline! .
DoC, I know you are a big fan of Hotels.com and I’m sure you know about CamelCamelCamel (CCC) price tracker for Amazon.
CCC have launched a similar price tracker for Hotels.com. Check it out https://camelodge.com/
Personally, I have saved any money yet. Also, it is still in beta.
Interesting. Let me add it to my list
List of things to look at, not this list
Thank, William, for sharing the two websites. As someone who has never visited them, I wonder if you have quick how-to0use tips or where-to-look advises on their websites; alternatively, maybe invite their owners to write an introductory article here.
Secret Flying is another good one. Flight Deal guys are good. https://www.secretflying.com
Do they ever do SPG/Marriott deals? I didn’t see any from the current/recent ones
I used to follow the flight deal website, but sometimes I don’t get too many good deals and they are kind of slow updating deals. I am now using Scott’s cheap flight email list because they deliver more good deals more quickly. They offer free version and paid version (probably more deals), and I am pretty happy with the free version and have purchased at least two tickets because their deal alerts. Highly recommended. (I am not paid by anyone for the statement above)
https://www.lastminutetravel.com/
Last Minute Travel for 90 dollar stays at the Intercontinentals Hotels in Latin America
I’m a big fan of Last Minute Travel and Last Minute Travel Club, though they’ve been a bit worse during the last year. Their hotel booking engine is powered by Tourico Holidays, which is the company that used to power Sam’s Club Travel hotel booking (until Sam’s Club cancelled Sam’s Club Travel services about a year ago or so). I’ve gotten so many great deals through them that when Sam’s Club cancelled the travel program, I called them up and asked which other sites I could use to continue booking through their engines. They told me about Last Minute Travel.
There is also Last Minute Travel Club (lmtclub.com) which theoretically has annual subscription fee but practically it’s free to join (I used a commonly available coupon code for a “free one year membership” that never expired). I’m not sure if they still pretend to charge for it or not. The rates through LMTClub were a few dollars cheaper than the main lastminutetravel site. My theory is that it’s easier for hotels to refuse matching a low rate if they can tell you that you are looking at a “paid membership program rates”, but I could be totally off base.
They seem to have lost some of the nicer chains they used to have deals with (Riu, Iberostar for sure, probably some others), but there are still great deals to be had. I managed to snag Dreams in Puerto Vallarta at $150/night when most other travel sites had it for around $250/night.
Never an issue with a reservation (after booking through them for several years, both via Sam’s Club Travel and Last Minute Travel), other than hotels sometimes not seeing that the reservation is pre-paid and then double-charging me. Doesn’t happen that much, but when it does I was able to call LastMinuteTravel and had their customer service rep talk to the hotel clerk and explain where to look for the fact that the room is prepaid. So good customer service overall.
I’m not getting paid by them or get any referral fees, just sharing the info. It is a great site for hotels. Booked rental cars through that site a couple of times as well.