Senior Highlights....

AIRLINE DISCOUNTS

When the urge to fly off to a fantastic destination overtakes you, the first question is always, “How much does it cost to get there?” The answer is, “It depends.”

It depends on what you know, who you know, and how much time you are willing to spend to find the best fare. The one truism in modern air travel is that few people on a plane headed to the same place paid the same price. If you want to play the fare game, you need to be prepared to absorb a glut of information, according to several leading travel experts.

Tom Parsons, founder of Best Fares discount travel magazine and author of the Insider Travel Secrets book, employs 40 people to support his role as a leading discount travel guru. His six researchers comb through 130 newspapers and scour the Internet by the hour to track the fluctuations in airfares.

“I pay them to be bored! Scouring the Web can be tedious,” Parsons cracks, interrupting his high-speed stream of fare factoids to comment on his staff. “I tell people all the time, you get the best fare and I can still beat it.”

Parsons’ confidence in this claim is because his staff does more than monitor the latest fare war -- they also track special certificates, merchandise tie-ins and niche consumer programs.

“I think today the consumer should book through a good agent, but the consumer still has to do a lot of research. I still believe the worst place to go shopping is the airlines. But even agents won’t research odd promotions. The travel agent can sell you what’s in the computer, but why pay it?” he asks.

As an example, he cites the fares his parents paid last year to fly to Honolulu first class: $550 each. The quoted fare is usually around $4,000. His parents took advantage of a number of incentives to get this fare, including a travel certificate program offered by Delta’s Executive Woman Traveler site (which is open to anyone) on the Internet.

“They couldn’t believe it! Dad is still slurring from all the free wine they got in first-class,” he jokes.

Parsons also tracks the airfare “freebies” that various companies tie-in to the purchase of their products or services. The long-distance telephone companies such as Sprint, MCI and AT&T continually offer frequent flier mileage and travel certificates for switching over to their services.

“Call the companies and ask if they are giving anything away. This is worth a lot more than a few free minutes! What’s that worth, $15?! Get the certificate! I know people who switch their long-distance service every two months just to get the freebies,” he says.

Parsons has published Best Fares magazine for 14 years and now has 50,000 subscribers. He also has a Web site that promotes the latest breaking deals that missed the magazine deadline and will expire before the next issue. Over 70,000subscribe to the company’s email distribution list, too. The book, the magazine, and the Web site are all valuable, but senior travelers still will have to wade through a lot of information about hot airfare deals to specific destinations.

Despite the volume of information and Parsons’ creative ticketing ideas (outlined in his Insider Travel Secrets book), some may not always work well for senior travelers. Even Parsons admits this. For example, he claims he pioneered the term and popularity of booking “hidden cities” many years ago -- meaning that it’s cheaper to book through a stopover or connection in one city on a flight that goes on to another destination than it is to book directly to the first city. The traveler simply gets off at the “hidden” or first city.

“This is best for someone who needs to go somewhere one way fast and who has no baggage to check through. It’s best for emergencies, not vacations. There’s nothing illegal about hidden cities, though,” he says. “It’s just a violation of airline rules.”

The American Society of Travel Agents (ASTA) doesn’t hold this sanguine view, however. ASTA spokesman Steve Loucks says that “hidden cities” and many other forms of creative ticketing are illegal by airline standards, although not by the federal government. If the airline discovers a traveler using this method, ASTA says airlines will impose full fare penalties on the traveler and could pull ticketing privileges from a travel agent who is breaking their rules and ticketing customers like this.

“We’ve tried to clarify the situation (about creative ticketing), but sometimes it’s a losing battle,” Loucks says. “A savvy travel agent is still your best bet. A travel agent can help you sort through all the options and find out what’s best for your specific needs. The travel agent can help you sort through the glut of information.”

Loucks says travel agents have a built-in incentive to find the best fares: the desire to have a repeat client base. He cites a December, 1996, U.S. Public Interest Research Group study that showed travel agents did indeed provide the lowest fares for airline tickets. “You won’t get prompts from the airlines with ideas for cheaper travel,” he observes.

With the growing popularity of the Internet, however, the information is easier to obtain. Domestic airlines’ Web sites not only provide information on such things as schedules, in-flight movies, seating arrangements and regulations, many of them post last-minute deals, as well. American, Cathy Pacific and Aer Lingus even hold online silent auctions. Those on the email mailing lists of American, USAir and Continental can get weekly notification of last-minute deals; Northwest posts discount notices on its Web site each Wednesday. When surfing their sites, senior travelers should also check out each special incentive program, whether it seems like you would fit or not. Delta’s Executive Woman Traveler site, sponsored by American Express, provides travel certificates to those who fill out the survey, executive women or not. Travelers should also be able to find out about generous programs for seniors online, either through the Best Fares or airline sites.

You should also always check for special senior airfares and discounts (including other travel-related expenses). Most airlines have special programs for seniors and they can vary greatly. It never hurts to ask.

For instance, USAir has two special programs for anyone 62 or older. The USAir Senior Saver Fare can save you 10% on all USAir and USAir Express flights systemwide, except to or from selected foreign destinations. These savings even apply to their already-discounted fares. You can also bring along one companion of any age and save 10% of that person's fare as well. This plan has few limitations, but it does not apply to certain special fares, including government, military, children, joint, contract, and Visit USA fares.

USAir's Golden Opportunities Coupon Books offer another great way for seniors to save. Each coupon is valid for a one-way ticket on USAir or USAir Express between any two applicable cities (U.S., Canada, Mexico, Puerto Rico, or the U.S. Virgin Islands) or for a round-trip ticket between any two Florida cities. You can also use your coupons for grandchildren between the ages of 2 and 11 for travel with you.

Golden Opportunities coupons are valid for one year from the date of issuance and you must make your reservations at least 14 days prior to departure. Books of four coupons currently cost $596. Contact your travel agent or call USAir at 800-428-4322.

There’s a big market out there for do-it-yourself travelers, and the developers of the enormous Travelocity service on the Web know this. Travelocity is probably the leading travel Web site, based upon the SABRE computer reservation system -- the same online reservations system used by most travel agents. Travelocity provides real-time travel booking capacity for more than 400 airlines (and schedules for more than 700 airlines), 32,000 hotel properties and 50 car rental companies worldwide. Travelocity also offers a low fare search engine that checks 900 different fare routings and combinations for up to five different itinerary segments and provides the three lowest priced options. Users can make their own reservations and either ticket through a local travel agent or have Travelocity’s customer service department do it.

“The travel industry is a very complex game. There have been several attempts to simplify it, but they’ve never stuck. We’re here to support travel agents, but we see that Travelocity provides a way for the customer who likes to shop to get the information they need,” says George Lynch, Travelocity’s director of marketing and communications. “The advantage of Travelocity is that because there is so much information out there, we’ve worked hard to make it easy for consumers to come to one place and get the information they need. We are really focused on trying to give all the information travelers need upfront, so that they can anticipate the experience once they get there.”

Which leads full-circle back to the tried-and-true notion that an established travel specialist who has been where you want to go is probably still a senior traveler’s best resource.

SIDEBAR: RESOURCES TO PLAY A FARE GAME

Best Fares’ Web site is at http://www.bestfares.com. There is much useful information on this site, but the best deals are available to the Best Fares magazine subscribers only. The monthly magazine is available for $59.95 ($10 off for those who are referred by or order the Internet). Call (800) 880-1234 to order. Insider Travel Secrets (1996, Best Fares, Inc.) by Tom Parsons is $19.95, available through the same toll-free number. The updated edition will be out in April, 1997.

Travelocity’s Web site is http://www.travelocity.com.

Aer Lingus’ Web site is at http://www.aerlingus.ie.

Alaska Airlines is at http://www.alaskaair.com.

America West is at http://www.americawest.com.

American is at http://www.americanair.com.

Cathay Pacific is at http://www.cathay-usa.com.

Continental is at http://www.flycontinental.com.

Delta is at http://www.delta-air.com.

Northwest is at http://www.nwa.com.

Southwest is at http://www.iflyswa.com.

TWA is at http://www.twa.com.

United is at http://www.ual.com.

USAir is at http://www.usair.com.

SIDEBAR: AIRLINE SAFETY RECORDS

Airline safety records, including accidents and major civil fines, are now available online. Among other things, travelers will be able to tell whether their airlines has had near collisions or had to pay a stiff fine for a major violation of the safety laws. Previously, most of the information was only available to consumers through a formal filing under the Freedom of Information Act. The FAA made this data available for the first time in February. The Web address is http://www.faa.gov.