
Deciding when to buy a plane ticket can be a frustrating thing. The prices go up and down, sometimes several times a day.
I’ve even had times where I have been looking for a flight on an airline’s web site and from the time I selected flights to when I go to pay, the price has changed.
It used to be there were best times of the week to buy a ticket, but not so anymore. It is more of a free-for-all now.
Even if you buy a ticket and the price drops, all is usually not lost.
Here’s how I take advantage of price reductions.
Shop for what you want
Full disclosure, I’m a Delta Airlines loyalist, so I try to fly them whenever I can because I have status, can enjoy the lounges, and often get free upgrades. That being said, if there is a huge price difference between them and another airline, I will consider flying someone else.
I usually look for the flights I want and take a note of the price. The next day, I look again and see what the price did. Did it stay the same? Go up? Go down? Unless I urgently need a ticket or the price is great when I look the second time, I do this for a few days and see what happens with the price.
You might start to notice a pattern.
Buy the ticket
After following the price for a few days, when I see it go down again or if I see it stabilizing for a couple days, I go ahead and buy the ticket.
It is important to note the time you buy the ticket, because with United States based airlines, you have 24 hours to change your mind and get a refund.
Because of that, I always check the price of the ticket I purchased within that 24 hours to see if the price went down. If it does, you can usually get a refund to the method of payment.
That happened to me today when I ticket I bought went down a whopping $500 from when I booked it yesterday. One call to Delta and I had that $500 refunded to my credit card because it was within that 24-hour timeframe.
Keep checking the price
Even after 24 hours passes, keep checking the price of your existing tickets. If the price drops, you sometimes have options.
Many airlines will not give you a refund to your method of payment, but they will give you some kind of credit with the airline to use for a future flight.
This also happened to me recently when two positioning tickets I bought to get me in place for a complex international flight dropped by $30 each.
Another quick call to Delta and I had a $30 ecredit issued to my account for each flight.
Make sure to take note of all of these credits by writing down the ticket number, the ecredit number, and the date of issue. They don’t always show up automatically in your online accounts.
I have a spreadsheet where I track all of these types of credits and when I use them so I make sure I don’t leave free money behind.
A lot of this became possible when many airlines eliminated change fees during COVID times and they never came back, luckily.
It isn’t always this easy, but usually a call to the airline can make this happen.
I do the same for hotel reservations I have. Prices often fluctuate and it’s worth a few minutes of my time to rebook.
Have you ever had success doing this?