Here are twenty secret tips to book cheap flight in India. Let’s explore one by one!
1.Use the special debit and credit card offers
I personally never had given a lot of thought to this tip earlier. I mostly used to use the coupons and codes mentioned on coupon sites, and but there are various special offers designed especially for the debit card and credit card holders only.
For example if you have kotak bank card, you should search for “sbi offers flight tickets” on Google and you will surely get some page on the sbi website or airline ticket booking websites which will give you some special codes for getting additional discount.
2. Use the wallet cash to get further discount
Many websites now have their own wallets. It’s one of the most trusted ways to get additional discounts on flights/hotels and other bookings. All the websites like makemytrip, yatra, goibibo have this concept of virtual wallets and you recieveome cash backs in this wallet which can be partially used while making the payments.
3. Book within 30-90 days in advance
Expedia did an interesting study and found out that on an average the cheapest flight tickets sold was 57 days in advance. They studied various domestic flights prices and saw the trend, booking too early or too late will not work .
4.Take flights at odd hours
If you are okay travelling late at night, then you can get low fare on flights. But this might not work when you need to reach at a particular time or when you are traveling with family. However people travelling solo who do not have a fix time to reach can benefit from this option.
5.Try flexible dates
If you do not have rigid plans, you can look at dates which are either 1 or 2 days earlier or later than your planned date. Often, you will find out that many times you might get a cheaper option on a different date which is very close to the date you have decided.
6.Use mobile apps for booking
If you are still using the web browser for booking fights, you are missing some great offers provided by various apps. From time to time apps offers some discount codes which will reduce your fights prices by around 5-10% at least.
The benefits you generally get when you book your flights from mobile apps are
- more reward points (cashback points)
- exclusive discount/cashback offers
- discount on meals booking
7.Make payments by Wallets
Did you know that you can get additional cashback when you pay from wallets like Mobikwik, paytm, freecharge, google pay?
That’s true, you will get the cashback provided all the terms and conditions are met.
8.Book two single flights from different providers
If you want to go a little extra mile and are ready to spend some extra time, then you can also explore booking two single flights instead of a return flight or a connecting flight and receive maximum cashback and discounts.
9.Book directly from airlines website
If you can’t find any cashbacks or discounts on the intermediary websites like makemytrip, ixigo,paytm, expedia, goibibo etc, then it’s a good idea to check the flight rates directly on the airline website. Airlines pay some commission to these other websites and often the prices at the airlines are a little cheaper.
10.Use incognito mode while researching
Most of the airlines will keep changing their flight ticket prices dynamically as per the demand and supply. So when you keep searching for a particular flight on a particular day, and then keep researching about for next few minutes, the airlines and the intermediary websites understand that there is a demand for a particular flight and when you spend too much time just researching, they know that your chances of buying a flight ticket has increased and so their prices rise to create an urgency.
11.Use Student & Senior Citizen Discount if applicable
Many airlines now allow students and senior citizens basic discount on the base fare, it’s a small discount like 8-10%, but still saves you a little money. If you are travelling with your children or parents, you might want to check if you can receive further discounts.
12.Use hand-baggage-only fare tickets
If you are travelling alone and don’t have much of luggage, choose the hand-baggage only option while booking the flight. Airline’s expenses increase when the flight is heavy and hence they give incentive if you carry less luggage.
13.Put alert for price decline
Google Flights jave an option where they track the prices of a particular flight and will notify or email you from time to time when the prices change. So if you have some time left and can wait for the booking, better wait and track the prices.
14.Subscribe to the Airfare Newsletter
You can subscribe to newsletters if you don’t mind constant emails on offers, various airlines and intermediary sites will send you various offers from time to time. It will surely help someone who travels a lot.
15.Book now, Pay Later
Some websites like Yatra and Goibibo have introduced option to book the flight without paying the money ( like blocking the seats) . You can block it and pay after few days.
16.Don’t be loyal to one website only
If you are loyal to one website of an airline or an intermediary, then you might miss out on some good offers from other websites. If you want to save some money it’s always useful to quickly surf 3-4 options and then choose the best option.
17.Go for combo offers
The most common combo offers are the return trips. However, if you cancel your journey, some airlines might force you to cancel the return as well. Therefore, go for the combos only if the return fare has a significant discount. Next in line are hotel-plus offers and meal offers
18.Wait for offers
Most travelers have to plan their trips in advance , and offers pour in almost on a weekly basis, so travelers have to act fast to benefit. So if you have enough time you should wait for some good offer.
19.Check out for coupons and offers
One thing that everyone can do is search for offers, while booking for the flights. There are various websites which offer different types of discount or cashback for booking flights. Sometimes you will find offers for booking two way flights, or for international flights and sometimes it’s based on the total ticket price. For example if you want to book a domestic flight there are some great AirAsia coupons , you can get Air Asia Promotional Offer – 20% OFF on Domestic Fares, You can use Google pay or PayPal offers too.
20.Book on a weekday
A trend shows that flights are cheaper on Monday and Tuesday, it makes sense since most people would choose weekends to travel .