After many years of saving we finally decided to have an european holiday before the end of this year.
Only suitable flights seem to be Emirates or Qantas (Emirates codeshare).
So tapping in to the great OZbargainers knowledge to find the cheapest way to buy the tickets.
Credit cards points are only worth 1% at best, so not big deal.
Credit card churning not really possible because once retired nobody wants to give you a credit card.
No frequent flyers points available.
Flight Centre gift cards would be good, but I have not seen a 10% deal in a long time.
Any ideas welcome and appreciated.
Cheers
Most Economical Way to Buy Qantas or Emirates Overseas Flight
EveryLastCent on 07/07/2023 - 17:51
Comments
Very true.
Probably just looking at buying from Qantas, Emirates or possibly Flight Centre if discounted gift cards come up for sale.Singapore Airlines,Qatar also very good.
I agree that Singapore Airlines is excellent. The only downside with "SQ" is that because of their high quality, they are quite popular, with the result that the load factors are high and therefore the chances of getting a spare seat beside you are slim. My most recent trip with them was MEL-Amsterdam return. Their A350 was quite comfortable and quiet. The food was good, the staff were exceptional. The flights were on time. A complaint is that they kept the cabin temperature WAY too low. Everyone was having to use their blankets because it was so cold! A second issue affecting shorter passengers is that the overhead lockers are very high, forcing some people to have to stand on the side of the aisle chair, which can be slippery / dangerous. I saw one lady fall down trying to achieve this.
I was wondering about that, and have been hesitant to use them. What would be the difference between them and say flight Centre? What sort of situations could arise where is better to have booked through FC or direct with the airline?
In case you need any changes to your purchased ticket, it is better if you have purchased directly with the airline
Otherwise you have to deal with the intermediary agent and pay their additional fees. On top of being a lot more difficult to access the intermediary agent than the airline from overseas.
Timing is everything with flights. I'd narrow it down to dates and carriers, then set price alerts with Google Flights. The prices will go up and down as new buckets are released. I wouldn't like to leave it more than 3 months out although bargains can pop up a couple of months before.
Also consider things like length of flight, stops and length of stops, convenience of departure and arrival times. I like overnight flights as you save on hotels.
And yes as above book directly with airline where possible.Thank you. I didn't think about setting up alarms. Will do that.
Checking the prices every day though.
Not much choice of flights available. There used to be so much choice before Covid. Now only Emirates seems viable for our flight. And the price is close to 80% more đ¤ŹEmirates to Europe is currently around $2200 or less return for April/May next year… timing is everything!
I wish I had all that time. Looking at September or October…2023!
@EveryLastCent: So I just bought a flight to Belgium for that period with emirates, use the "I have flexible dates" option in the search to find the cheapest price on emirates website, then I found the coupon code AUEBOOK that gave me around 8% discount which is about 200$ on a ticket price of 2750$.
It seems like the latest you can travel the cheaper it becomes until you get close to the EOY holidays.
@LePhasme: Yes about $3000 is the price.
Strange enough it would be cheaper leaving in 2 days and coming back in August! Not feasible for me unfortunately.
Economy or business?
Economy!!! I don't think they will take me for cheaper in the cargo area đ¤Ł
This deal may be of interest https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/780734
But I've had a LOT of friends and customers go to europe recently - lots of queues, and everything is way more expensive than pre covid. Don't be surprised if you spend $2000 on flights, then $2000 for 6 nights hotel accommodation, depending on how comfortable/uncomfortable you can handle in accommodation. Also you've left it way too late to get any really good deals on anything, the days of last minute deals to europe don't seem to exist anymore, given the huge demand currently.
If finances are a concern, consider SE asia? We spent a week in Malaysia back in Feb, 5 star hotels were $120/night. Going to Vietnam in November ($500 for 2 people return flights on vietjetair) and again hotels incredibly cheap. Apart from that, incredible food and scenery and relatively short flights compared to europe.
Europe is expensive now. Maybe less so if going central/Eastern Europe. Went to France last year and certainly expensive. Lucky I used points for Business tickets, and points for (4+1 free) Paris. Saved a fair bit there.
$2000 on flights would be great! Try $3000 and still not enough.
Accommodation not a problem as we will be visiting old friends that are living there now.
If you're prepared to leave in late August and do two stopovers: <$1,700 with China Eastern
We flew with China Southern many years ago. It was very cheap! I still remember them cancelling an internal connecting flight when we were waiting for it at the gate. Nobody would speak english and no staff to help. When we found a China Southern service desk they pretended they didn't speak english even if they had a badge saying "I speak english". After yelling for over 10 minutes and elbowing all the other chinese passengers that wanted to step in front of me I managed to get help from a staff. It was war…fight or die.
Never again!
Edit. I was a lot more fighty back then. Now I prefer to pay a bit more đ
Agree with above. Seems a shame to save up for years and then book last minute flights, accommodation etc at such a busy expensive time! Can you wait until next year? If you're determined to go, just accept that it will cost you. Gift cards, cash back and 3rd party bookers are risky and will only save you pennies.
With the way things have been in the last few years I am a bit reluctant to wait another year. Never know what is going to happen…and now things have been arranged. So, yes I accept it will cost me. But in OZbargain spirit still trying to save everylastcent!
I have been keeping an eye on the prices for 6 months and they have not changed much other than for a couple of days a week ago when they were down about 10%. Silly me I didn't jump at it thinking that they may be on the way down further.
Most economic way is not to pay at all lol. Well, a few way to save your hard earn money:
- Consider fly from South East Asia and 2nd tier airlines (Vietnam airline, Thai, Philippine et). They are very competitive for price e.g <2k$ for biz class. https://loyaltylobby.com/2023/06/29/airfare-of-the-day-businâŚ
-Look for discount code from Emirates (e.g 5-10% off via Bupa rewards, Citibank/Amex congiere..etc)
-Consider book a nested trip (google if you dont know) or fith freedom flyUnfortunately PAL doesn't operate to Europe anymore (since 2020). They had the absolute best deals like $700 one-way Sydney to London :(
Yeah, looked at alternatives, but anything else than Emirates (or Qantas code share), the flight duration goes from 25 hours to 35 or 40 hours.
Unfortunately gone are the days when we would gladly do an extra 10 or 15 hours flight to save $5-600 each on a flight. Those were the days…
Very interested in your mention to 10% discount codes for Emirates. Where can I get that please?If youâre retired, why not extend your transit and have a couple nights to see an extra country?
Strange enough we seem to have more committments now that we are retited than before. Unbelievable but true.
If you're willing to take a small amount of risk, look on Ozbargain classifieds.
once retired … Only suitable flights seem to be Emirates or Qantas (Emirates codeshare)
Why limit yourselves to those airlines? Singapore, Qatar, BA, Air France, Virgin and ore come to mind. Don't be afraid of connecting out of another city like Perth/Adelaide/Melbourne. As a retiree, I'm guessing you wont might a stopover or two.
There's still some good value in round-the-world tickets.
Flight Centre gift cards would be good, but I have not seen a 10% deal in a long time.
Don't do it. You'll find they have "service fees" or markup on their fares now that ruin any benefit of discounted gift cards.
If you really want to pursue this path keep an eye out for webjet. I believe might be available on one of those ultimate multi-merchant cards.
european holiday
You didn't mention what cities but keep in mind that LHR has ridiculously high taxes and flying to CDG might be cheaper.
I agree, people always want to fly to London first, much better off flying to cheapest European airport, just search Brisbane-Europe on Google flights.
If touring across Europe sometimes better to do a multi city flight like Brisbane-Paris Rome-Brisbane ($2200 on Emirates in October), that way you donât have to waste time returning to first airport to fly back.hi
Is there a tool that helps to find good multi-city flights ? I'm in general flexible with cities and dates within my holiday dates in Europe so might try that option.I look at the city pairs serviced by the low cost carriers (easyJet, Ryanair) and figure out where high-speed rail works. I donât know of a metasearch because the LCCs donât sell via aggregators.
Google flights multi city search
@Stewardo: Do you mean you just try various city and dates combinations ? are there any tricks to find the cheapest combinations?
@vasya: I look for one way fares to Europe
ie SYD-Europe on Google flights on roughly the day you want to depart.
When you find a cheap destination ie Syd-AMS
Search one way SYD-AMS but donât put a date and it will populate cheapest day on calendar.
Then use Wikipedia to search airports/airlines
Which match your first fares airline, like ETIHAD SYD-AMS-FCO-SYD
You can then search for one way FCO-SYD to find cheapest day, then join the two cheap one way fare dates together on a multi city flight.You can also use apps like, FlightConnections
Entertainment book has an emirates discount code.
Search online for discount codes then book direct with the airline.Very interesting. Do you know what % discount please?
10% off base fare I think, Qatar has a similar code going at the moment
I don't have the entertainment book, but it may be worth buying just for that.
Do you know what they mean with base fare?@EveryLastCent: Discount codes for airlines normally donât include taxes levies surcharges etc, just the base.
@Stewardo: I saw some codes for emirates discounts, but there is no option to put them in the online booking payment. Only option is for emirates vouchers.
On the emirates search flights page, top right corner âoptionsâ click this and add promo code before searching for flights.
Do you have to log in first?
Edit. Found, Thank you!
There's quite a few dates for these Virgin Atlanic flights (Operated by Delta) that are quite cheap ($1152) flying from Sydney via LAX into Paris. Can possibly do a few days stopover in LA if you wanted to. I'm unsure how to book direct with the airline as the delta flights don't show up on Virgin Atlantic website and on Delta website everything is super expensive, but I have been into a travel agent and they also show up in their systems, so should be able to book via Flight Center if you don't want to use any of the questionable online agents.
Play around with the itinerary , if you are willing to travel to Bangkok or Jakarta or some other Asian destinations such as Vietnam or Philippines first on a budget airline , the fares are way cheaper from these cities to Europe and it would break the long trip up. Also Scoot have some very good fares to many destinations that you could get to Europe from. So many other airlines to choose from. Also you could get 2 holidays for the price of one if trip duration is not an issue. Have you tried using search engines like Kayak, Orbitz , Google Flights , ITA matrix . I would not use a travel agent as you need to pay fees to make any changes , you canât deal with the airline direct for any changes and are restricted to travel agent hours , fees are payable for changes and cancellations. If you happen to book via Asia allow at least a day or two in Asia before travelling to Europe to allow for any delayed flights. There are so many interesting options out there , you donât need to take the most direct route . Good luck and hope you find something good . Also there are many promo codes around for airlines to get 10 or 12 percent discount
Thank you. Unfortunately no scope for longer holiday this time.
I have been searching a lot and to get any xheaper the travel time jumps from 25 hours (1stop) to 50 hours (2 or 3 stops).
We used to have a lot more choice from Brisbane to Europe with accepable travel time. Now Emirates seems to be the only one
28 Degrees card has a 5% credit offer with spend on Emirates.
Thank you, I checked it out. Unfortunately it is not a credit offer like a cashback that could be added and stack to a Emirates discount code.
It is a Emirates code, the same code as paying with a mastercard, that gives 5%discount on the booking.
So still only 5% off.
Interesting info here. I am wondering if (like us, who are also just retired) you have settled on Emirates/Qantas because they allow eight hour (ish) travel legs.
We have travelled back and forth (Melbourne to London/Melbourne to Manchester) for over twenty-five years; but now the thought of the 12 - 14hr leg (non-stop) is just not bearable (or particularly healthy:).
Emirates do 2 short stops on the way to the UK (Singapore and Dubai); but frustratingly do not stop for a second time in Singapore on the way back!
We are planning to fly next May; so we continue to search… We wish you luck.
WARNING! From personal experience do book via Webjet! Suffice to say look them up on Product Review. It is the last time our son will ever give us their travel vouchers!
The big problem with Emirates out of Melbourne is the crappy timing. The flights leave at about 2AM to Singapore, and 5AM and 10PM to Dubai so either way, you lose a night's sleep. (EDIT - Emirates do offer a daytime flight from SIN to MEL on the way back.)
If you're looking for the best timing, think about Qatar instead of Emirates. From Melbourne, there's a 14.5 hour leg to Doha leaving at about 3.30PM, getting into Doha about 11PM (6AM Melbourne time). The big advantage of Doha is the airport hotel, so rather than taking a 3 hour layover, go for a 10 hour layover and get a few hours sleep in the Doha airport hotel. This will start the process of adjusting to European time as Doha is only an hour ahead of Europe and two hours ahead of the UK. (It's a shame that Qatar's 777 economy seat is so crap - very narrow and cramped.)
In Melbourne you have more options.
From Brisbane there is really only 1 option to go direct with only 1 stop.
Qantas or Emirates, same flight run by Emirates.
Unless we add a stop to get to Melbourne or Sydney first, but that adds easily 5 or 6 hours to the total trip with the added risk of delayed or cancelled domestic flight.
Assume you mean âdo NOT book via Webjetâ rather than âdo book via Webjetâ.
Thank you! I really did mean "Do NOT book anything with Webjet!".. Unfortunately I cannot edit my post now :(.
You seem overly wedded to Emirates. My wife and I flew with them MEL-Dubai-Rome-Dubai-Singapore-MEL. The Airbus A380 aircraft are supurb whereas the B777 aircraft were quite average. We generally had a poor experience with them. Our connection to Rome included a free hotel room for our 8.5 hours in Dubai. Our flight arrived an hour late and then we and a hundred other passengers were forced to wait 2.5 hours for our bus tranfer to the hotel. That left 5 hours, less time to check in, check out, get transferred back to the airport, etc. We ended up being able to use the room for only 3 hours. After our cruise from Rome, we arrived very early at the airport and a different Emerites flight was being checked in to Dubai. We asked to take that one instead of the one we were booked on 4 hours later, they told us sure, that it was only 2/3 full, BUT that we would have to pay a US$200 each "change fee". They admitted that our flight was actually over-booked and that we were doing them a favour if taking the earlier flight, but, they would not relent on the fee. We refused to pay, and took the later (full) flight. Stupid. When we got to Dubai, we had one of their stoopover packages that included a good hotel, but after we got there, the hotel advised us that they were undergoing substantial construction works and that we should accept a transfer to a different hotel. Several days later, when flying Dubai to Singapore, dejavu… the flight we were booked on was a full one with a stop in Columbo. An alternative direct flight was available BUT, again, they would require 2 x US$200 each as a change fee, which we refused. Upon arrival in Columbo, the staff refused to allow transit passengers to disembark, they turned off the air-conditioning, and brought cleaners on-board to totally disrupt things, hit our legs with vacuum cleaners, etc. Disgusting. Also, during that flight, the toilets ran out of toilet paper and the floor was covered in urine, and the crew did nothing to fix these things. When passengers would stand up during the transit stop, the crew would yell at us to sit down! What a shit of an airline it was that day.
We flew before with Emirates and never had problems. Dubai is a good airport too.
Worst problems were with Cina Southern (nightmare in China) and with Lufthansa (they cancelled last leg of our trip from Frankfurt because the plane was almost empty so they just put us in a cheap hotel at 10pm, 1&1/2 hour bus trip from the airport only to get back to the airport next day at 8am!!!).Dubai airport is so huge that older less fit people like me struggle with the long distances that we are expected to walk. We also had to go up and down levels multiple times as the layout is less than ideal. Very poor is that many of the departure gate waiting areas are terribly small and because not all waiting passengers can fit, that they spill out, being forced to stand up, into the walk-ways, thus making very difficult the task of passengers trying to make their way thru to their own departure gates. Chaos. Especially serious if the departing aircraft is a high capacity A380.
Not sure where you are wanting to go in Europe, but if you are in Brisbane (your profile says Queensland so am running off that assumption) and are willing to use a not Qantas or Emirates airline, have a look at the Taiwanese options.
Cheapest round trip I can see full stop at the moment is EVA Air. They connect through Taipei, Taiwan to a number of places in Europe, and from my understanding are a decent airline. Out of Brisbane they fly their quite new Boeing 787-10s, for the legs to Europe on their 777s. (Bizzarely\usefully, you can do a Google Streetview tour of their airplane cabins - here is the 787-10 and here is the 777)
By way of example, the following itinerary in economy for two people is $3966 all up ($1983 pp) with the main downside being the nearly 12 hour layover on the return:
Brisbane (BNE) to London (LHR) on Mon, Oct 2:
Brisbane (BNE) to Taipei (TPE) on Mon, Oct 2, 10:15 PM to 5:15 AM (9h 0m), EVA Air Flight BR316
Boeing 787-10 Economy (V)Layover in Taipei (TPE) - 3H 35M
Taipei (TPE) to Bangkok (BKK) on Tue, Oct 3, 8:50 AM to 11:35 AM (3h 45m). EVA Air Flight BR67
Boeing 777 Economy (V)Fuel Stop in Bangkok (BKK) - 1H 15M
Bangkok (BKK) to London (LHR) on Tue, Oct 3, 12:50 PM to 7:25 PM (12h 35m), EVA Air Flight BR67
Boeing 777 Economy (V)London (LHR) to Brisbane (BNE) on Tue, Oct 17
London (LHR) to Bangkok (BKK) on Tue, Oct 17, 9:35 PM to 3:05 PM (11h 30m). EVA Air Flight BR68
Boeing 777 Economy (V)Fuel Stop in Bangkok - 1H 20M
Bangkok (BKK) to Taipei (TPE) on Wed, Oct 18, 4:25 PM to 9:15 PM (3h 50m), EVA Air Flight BR68
Boeing 777 Economy (V)Layover in Taipei (TPE) - 11H 55M
Taipei (TPE) to Brisbane (BNE) on Thu, Oct 19, 9:10 AM to 8:00 PM (8h 50m), EVA Air Flight 315
Boeing 787-10 Economy (V)A slightly more palatable itinerary without a long layover or with fuel stops is with China Airlines (not to be confused with Air China, China Southern or China Eastern who are mainland Chinese - China Airlines are Taiwanese) however you have to go through Sydney to achieve this, but China Airlines will sell you the complete BNE-SYD-TPE-LHR and vice versa on a single ticket so your connections are protected, it will just be Virgin Australia or Qantas who do the BNE-SYD leg. They would have you on a 737 for the domestic leg, then their A350s the rest of the way.
It's a bit more expensive than the EVA option at about $4545 round trip for two people ($2272 pp, ~$300 more per person) however that is not a bad premium on an international flight for a significantly more convenient itinerary:
Brisbane (BNE) to London (LHR) on Mon, Oct 2
Brisbane (BNE) to Sydney (SYD) on Mon, Oct 2, 5:05 PM to 7:40 PM (1h 35m), Virgin Australia Flight VA970
Boeing 737 Economy (T)Layover in Sydney (SYD) - 2H 30M
Sydney (SYD) to Taipei (TPE) on Mon, Oct 2, 10:10 PM to 4:40 AM (9h 30m), China Airlines Flight CI52
Airbus A350 Economy (N)Layover in Taipei (TPE) - 4H 20M
Taipei (TPE) to London (LHR) on Tue, Oct 3, 9:00 AM to 4:45 PM (14h 45m), China Airlines Flight CI81
Airbus A350 Economy (N)London (LHR) to Brisbane (BNE) on Tue, Oct 17
London (LHR) to Taipei (TPE) on Tue, Oct 17, 9:10 PM to 5:40 PM (13h 30m), China Airlines Flight CI82
Airbus A350 Economy (N)Layover in Taipe (TPE) - 5H 50M
Taipei (TPE) to Sydney (SYD) on Wed, Oct 18, 11:30 PM to 11:45 AM (9h 15m), China Airlines Flight 51
Airbus A350 Economy (N)Layover in Sydney (SYD) - 3H 15M
Sydney (SYD) to Brisbane (BNE) on Thu, Oct 19, 3:00 PM to 3:30 PM (1h 30m), Virgin Australia Flight 951
Boeing 737 Economy (T)Hopefully this is something that helps :)
You are better than a travel agent! Thank you!
I will pm you.
I made another forum post about this, but I got good advice on this post so I put it as a comment here too.
Now I found the best flights available at the best price.
Catch is that the flights are not available directly from the airline (I even spoke with them on the phone), but they are available and ready to be bought from a number of online travel agents. I know, with them any changes will be a costly pain. But the price difference is really substantial. Also I am retired and I have the time to chase them if it comes to that.
The question is which is the lesser evil between:
Aunt Betty VS BYOjet VS Jetabroad VS Ifly.net VS Expedia.
The first 4 are Australian registered. Expedia seems to be the oldest/more reliable? I know, none of them is good, but the price difference is thousands!Congratulations! Not Aunt Betty!
What is your bad experience with them?
It looks like BYOJet is exactly the same of Aunt Betty.A couple of recent threads here https://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum/149
I had unfortunately booked with Aunt Betty pre Covid, nightmare customer service, they just don't care.they just don't care.
Nobody cares any more.
Qantas, Virgin, Flight Centre, the banks, electricity providers, insurances, medicare, hospitals, the government, and the list goes on forever.
Unfortunately nobody cares any more. Those times are gone. We are on our own.
If you have 28 degrees credit card or Mastercard issued by certain Australian banks, there's currently a 5% off Economy & Business Class Saver and Flex/Flex Plus fares at Emirates Australia. The promo code is listed on Mastercard
Just beware of cheap flights offered by some of the bucket shops.
Prices may be attractive, but if anything goes wrong with the trip you are on your own.