Flights – Simple Travel Budget Hacks Everyone Should Know About

When it comes to travelling, most people don’t even bother with exploring to get the best deal. Some find it a pain whilst for others, the thought does not even cross their mind. 

I started travel hacking and looking for ways to travel on a budget when I saw my self travelling more. At this point you might be thinking, ‘What if I don’t travel a lot?’, ‘What if I only go on holiday once a year?’, ‘Am I really going to be saving that much?’. Well firstly, whether you’re travelling once a year or multiples times, money is money and there are still ways of saving. I mean who in their right mind despises the idea of saving money?

Read on below to find out six ways you can save on flights.

Exerting Effort Goes a Long Way

This is more of a tip to develop the right mindset.

When you look for flights, exert a little more effort. That’s the key principle here. You have to be in it to win it. As cheesy as it sounds, the concept is true. You will 100% make savings if you do that extra bit of searching.

There are various sites you can check such as Google Flights, Momondo, Skyscanner and even Kayak. One site will give you one price, whilst the other will give you another. Prices can fluctuate between each website, so it’s worth checking across multiple sites to get the best offer. Keep those tabs open to compare and make sure you get enough caffeine!

Use The Multi City Option (Going Via Another Country)

I booked flights to Kuala Lumpur with a stop over at Guangzhou (China) return to the UK; basically a multi city trip where you stop at one country and then head to another after a certain amount of time. I found this for around £450 on Google flights, but when I checked Momondo, it was down to £370. Ofcourse this was with China Southern Airline and not Etihad, but for someone who is looking to save money, it makes complete sense. 

Look At Alternative Airports 

Another thing to do when booking flights, is to book flights to alternative airports at your destination. When you’re searching for flights, type in the entire country you want to visit in the destination box and the search results will show you prices for each airport in that country.

Of course, it doesn’t make sense to do this if you want to visit one particular region in that country. But then again, that one region may have multiple airports.

I did this when I visited Cyprus. I typed in Cyprus in the destination box, and found flights to Paphos and Larnaca. Whilst they are at a distance from each other, it did not bother me at all. I went with Larnaca as that was the cheapest and eventually booked a return flight from Newcastle to Larnaca for around £206. By the way, this was in peak summer season (August 2018) so a return ticket to Larnaca would cost over £350. I not only only flexible with the airport at my destination, but was also flexible with where I flew from. I usually fly from Manchester, but went with Newcastle as this saved me over £200. All I did was drive my car (fuel costed £30 return), park it up using JustPark (around £15 for five nights parking), and that’s it!

Book Separate One Way Tickets

Another great tip when booking flights is to book separate one way tickets. I found that this works with short haul flights better. I was looking to book flights to Malaga in April, and after searching found a return flight from Manchester was over £100. However, I was also interested in visited the wonderful city of Marrakech, so I played around with the search and did this:

1. Searched for a single ticket from Manchester to Marrakesh – this costed me around £16
2. Searched for a single ticket from Marrakech to Malaga – this costed me around £13
3. Searched for a single ticket from Malaga to Manchester – this costed me around £18

Be Flexible

Additionally, play around with the dates. If you can, travel in the non-holiday season as prices can drop significantly. Talking specifically about months, I have found July and August to be some of the most expensive months to travel. If you are to book in these months, try to book in advance. If you end up booking late for these months, ensure that you follow the rules above to get the best price. 

I use Skyscanner or Google Flights to get a full months view of a flight which also gives me the cost of flights each day. It’s really useful as it means you don’t have to keep changing your date preferences to find the best price. 

Use Credit Cards To Gain Air Miles

I don’t know much about this as I do not have a frequent flyer credit card. For this to work, you need a credit card that rewards you with airmiles every time you make your every day purchases. Once you have racked up enough points, you can then spend these on flights, accommodation or car rentals. 

To read more about it, head over to Nomadic Matt’s page via the links below

Travel Credit Cards

How to be a Travel Hacker in the United Kingdom

If you know any other ways of travel hacking and budgeting for travelling, why not comment below letting the rest of us know. 

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