at what point do you decide that a flight ticket is 'worth it' ?

moneylover

well, you have some lovely countryside and Alton Towers!
Which agency do you use? I have to say that now we are retired we could swop all the time! We are actually moving next year to live nearer the children and becasue we have no actual reason to stay in Essex. We may go to Cambridge where daughter lives but very expensive - could do easy house swop there I think, Otherwise, and more likely, we may go near our son in Leicester in which case we would live in Market Harborough. Nice, but not sure about house swops there. Has got me thinking will have to search MSE and see what postings there are about house swops and their success.

Hastobe_Katt

I have pm'd you

budgetflyer

Moonchild wrote: »

I always used to work on the £10 per flying hour as being good value - however, this has undoubtably grown to around £15+ in the last couple of years (i.e. return to Singapore £390, Bangkok £360).

However this reflects that almost all of my flying is long haul to Asia, with little in Europe or Westbound. My most expensive flight in 2010 was with Air Asia (using the £ vs flying time - at about £70 per flying hour for Penang - Hong Kong - but that was my own fault as it was a last minute trip). I did manage to get a Hong Kong / Bali open jaw trip at the ticket desk for Singapore Airlines for flying that day for less than £17 per flying hour - which amazed me.

I have no loyalty to mileage schemes, so they don't come into the equation. I guess a similar equation would work for most people who are regulars to certain parts of the world.

Id reckon, long haul that up to £25 per hour flying time could be considered good value these days. For short haul, maybe up to £35.
We all like our £10 inc tax flights, which have to be loss leaders, but we must not let that influence what is a realistic "worth it" price.

whatyadoinsucka

tricky questions. convenience, airline, try to support our own economy..
not always possible

europe trips i like to pay maximum £60 return per person, i am within an hour 20 from doncaster, manchester, liverpool, leed, east midlands. so usually have good availability, will pay upto £120 for longer european destination if with lufthansa (a great airline)

flying long haul to delhi and back from kathmandu and unfortunately it had to be a middle east airline.
chose etihad as they have best flight times coming home, 9pm land 730am manchester, whereas the other airlines had a 12 hour stopover
paid £595 for sept, my mate got delhi for £315 return emirates. cheapest i could have was £440 finnair return (extra £70 Hathmandu to delhi) but the 50 mins at helsinki didn't seem long enough and didn't fancy having to be put up for the night, as we are going to helsinki in june anyway

happy with the price, we also considered bolivia and canada/usa but the flights seemed steep
reminds me i need to put a reminder in my calendar lufthansa to colombia for £440 came out in Feb, so will delay next years booking by a few weeks..

so in summary my main factors are price, convenience, airport (prefer liverpool fast bag turnaround), airline (lufthansa fav')
i'm not a big drinker when flying so free booze doesn't do it for me, although i've met people on usa flights who have said thats the reason they fly certain airlines.

Ponkle22

moneylover wrote: »

This alll sounds amazing you must live somewhere very nice yourself to be able to do these swops.
We live in Essex in a large modern house, near Chelmsford which is 30 mins from London by train and, whilst it is very nice, I cannot think that anyone would house swop with us.
QUOTE]

Whereas we live in a lovely area in a scruffy (needs updating) house, so can't see anyone wanting to swop with us either! Have considered it, until I saw the fabulous houses being offered to swop with the most amazing bathrooms and bedrooms etc. I had visions of the swopees being depressed when they arrived at our house and us being overwhelmed with excitement at the other end. :rotfl:

Ponkle22

Murphy_The_Cat wrote: »

I'm sure that we all have differing ideas on this, but I was curious as to how people decide that a flight ticket is 'worth it' or whether it is 'to dear'. (inspired by sickles thread).

I found that going on to the trip advisor forum for the area I was interested in and asking what the regular visitors consider a 'good price flight ticket' from my local airport would be. I received lots of advice where to look for tickets but eventually people quoted me prices that I could 'work from'. I wanted to know I was getting a decent price so I could 'watch' the prices and understand just how good a sale was.

Hope that helps?

Hastobe_Katt

Ponkle22 wrote: »

moneylover wrote: »

This alll sounds amazing you must live somewhere very nice yourself to be able to do these swops.
We live in Essex in a large modern house, near Chelmsford which is 30 mins from London by train and, whilst it is very nice, I cannot think that anyone would house swop with us.
QUOTE]

Whereas we live in a lovely area in a scruffy (needs updating) house, so can't see anyone wanting to swop with us either! Have considered it, until I saw the fabulous houses being offered to swop with the most amazing bathrooms and bedrooms etc. I had visions of the swopees being depressed when they arrived at our house and us being overwhelmed with excitement at the other end. :rotfl:

Have pm'd you. Bear in mind that while you see super posh houses offered, smaller more modest houses are also being offered. If you live in a desirable location (and London is a sought after location) you will have people interested. You need to be proactive and contact others - not sit and wait for the offers to come it.

Consider the price of an average London hotel room - with limited bedroom space, no cooking facilities, no outdoor space etc. Even a modest house is a big improvement at a huge price reduction. If you try to swap with a similar family i.e. both have kids, you have a different (and so more interesting) set of toys for your kids to explore, baby equipment available etc. Likewise we have traded use of camping gear. Exchangers will also do things like collect discount vouchers, public transport passes, local info, restaurant recommendations etc for each other - so it's not just the accommodation that you save on.

Murphy_The_Cat

Ponkle22 wrote: »

I received lots of advice where to look for tickets but eventually people quoted me prices that I could 'work from'. I wanted to know I was getting a decent price so I could 'watch' the prices and understand just how good a sale was.

Hope that helps?

Immensely.

I get the impression that some people on MSE have wholly unrealistic expectations on flight ticket prices, and consider themselves to be getting 'ripped off' at what the going rates currently are.

budgetflyer

Not really. Most people on MSE love a bargain and a tenner to Dusseldorf (or Ryanairs version of it) is a bargain. Most people, I would hope, see this as a "loss leader" and not a true reflection of the average fare.
Years ago as a family of 5, tour opps hammered us for flying from Scotland during the school holidays.
For me it was "worth it" to drive to Manchester or Birmingham for a cheaper flight to the costas, effectively halfing the cost of our holiday. That was B4 AirScotland and Globespan revolutionised flying from scotland. IMO It was them, not Ryanair or easyjet who brought the prices down North of the border initially.

dickydonkin

I am in the same position as eslick insomuch I am realisticly limited to NCL or Durham Tees Valley/Tesside aerodrome orwhatever it is called nowadays.

A great question considering how much flights have gone up recently,however, I have to state that over the years, I have had some fantastic prices - even as recently as January.

Which got me to thinking, have we had it too good over recent years and we are now getting a reality check?

I don't always believe cheapest is best and I do attempt to factor in flight times and connections, but I honestly believe that flying is still reasonably priced - particularly long haul.

Whether my assertion remains to be valid is another matter of course and with greedy governments who are taxing travellers to the hilt alongside the double whammy of fuel surcharges, I am wondering if the days of really cheap flights are confined to the past.

Furthermore with the current trend of consolidation of airlines, this will arguably reduce competition and increase fares in the future.

Hopefully, the hefty increases will deter people from flying and the airlines may review their pricing strategy, however, in the short term it seems we are going to paying a lot more for flights than we have been used to.