How a Travel Professional finds the least expensive fare to Tahiti
Going to Tahiti (French Polynesia)! Now pack your bags, oh wait you need a
ticket! You need this strategy for
finding the cheapest fare to Tahiti.
How to find the lowest fare when there are limited flights
from the U.S. to Tahiti. DW reveals his
process of finding the lowest fare.
A few givens; my home airport is SLC and I am looking for
Dates of 11 July-21 July. (cruises can make it difficult to be flexible with
dates)
1.
First I identify the carriers flying into
Tahiti (airport code PPT) from the U.S.
Google “direct flights from ppt”.
You will see that from the list of 34 cities with nonstop flights, from
the U.S. Mainland, there are only two carriers; Air Tahiti Nui and Air France.
2.
I determine who
partners with those airlines;
Air Tahiti Nui – American Airlines (One World Alliance)
Air
France – Delta Airlines (Sky Team Alliance)
Keep this information in the back
of your mind.
3.
Now the tedious part, I am looking for two options with each carriers web site;
a.
Look for your home city Airport, in my case SLC
to PPT.
Air Tahiti Nui - $2242
Air France – Boo! Air France website wont price from my home L
b.
Now look for the Gateway city (Los Angeles to
Tahiti). If the gateway is inexpensive,
I can buy a separate ticket to Los Angeles.
Air Tahiti Nui - $1755
Air
France - $2409
So after this step,
I am leaning towards booking a flight on Air Tahiti from Los Angeles for $1755 because
I know I can book a separate ticket for $224 on Delta. * The dreaded Baggage fees.. Knowing I have
status on Delta and will not have to pay for baggage is a plus, otherwise you
would have to budget another $50 for the roundtrip fare. Air Tahiti Nui does not charge for one piece
of baggage.
a.
Look for your home city airport, in my case SLC
to PPT.
Delta
Airlines – Shame on Delta; advertising for $1465 until the very last button to
purchase and the fare goes up to $2149.
This ploy is not the first I have encountered with Delta and it’s been
giving that message for three days. So
now Delta is really at $2149
American
Airlines - $2070.00
b.
Now look form the Gateway city (Los Angeles to
Tahiti)
Delta Airlines- $1759
American
Airlines - $1624
So
after this step, I know I can book the cheapest flight through the AA website
which happens to be the Air Tahiti Nui flight.
That $1624 looks like a great price; I would have to add $240 for a
Delta flight or Southwest for $183.
5.
One More
Site, in case I missed something. Just
to be safe, and make sure I didn’t miss something, I usually look at www.kayak.com from my home city and the gateway
city. Kayak is giving me the Green light
to “Buy now” as prices are unlikely to decrease over the next seven days. Unfortunately, Delta is still giving bad
information of a $1416 fare, but it is not valid and will bring up a message
that the fare is no longer available, again this is the same message I have
been getting for three days. So a bit
difficult to compare because you will waste hours hoping that the message does
not come up, but it does and will. I
like to verify pricing on Kayak and just to make sure I haven’t missed another
carrier. Kayak will always redirect you
to the carriers page so be careful not to get lulled into the game of a fare no
longer available (Delta). I did however
find a cheaper fare from the gateway through Air France for $1758.
6.
Narrow
down to the two best prices; At
this point, I can see that my best price option is booking through American
Airlines website from Los Angeles to Tahiti and adding another carrier from my
home city, Southwest is the cheapest.
This option is now $1807.
The second option is the booking through the
Delta website for $2149 from my home city.
I am tempted by this option, because I could check my bags all the way
through without having to recheck my bags in Los Angeles as is the case with my
first option.
7.
But Wait!
Did you check the schedules?
The booking through the home city on www.Delta
option ($2149) has a forced overnight in Los Angeles. You will have to pay for your hotel
overnight. That tipped the pricing for
me.
It looks like I will book two tickets, one
from the gateway on Air Tahiti Nui through AA.com and another ticket on
Delta.com from my home city to the gateway for a total of $1864. Why didn’t I book the cheaper option on
Southwest you ask? The schedules don’t
match up, so I will spend a few more dollars to avoid a forced overnight in Los
Angeles
So here it is….
www.delta.com
– SLC to Los Angeles - $240
and
www.aa.com
– flight on Air Tahiti Nui from Los Angeles to Tahiti - $1624.
Total: $1864.00
Caution:
When booking two separate airlines you need to be careful of connection
times. If my Delta Airlines flight is
delayed, I cannot afford to miss that Air Tahiti Nui flight, so leave ample
time.
Advice:
Know where to check-in before you arrive. The Delta flight is easy; it’s a delta plane
through the Delta website, so I will check-in with Delta. The American Airlines ticket is on an Air
Tahiti Nui plane, so check-in with Air Tahiti Nui which is located in the Tom
Bradley International Terminal of the Los Angeles Airport.
To-Do:
Let American Airlines know to put a note in your “record” that you are
arriving to Los Angeles on the Delta Flight.
Let Delta know you are arriving on an Air Tahiti Nui flight on the
return. Have the agents document this
information in your itinerary/”record”.
Update to this Post….
So I was bugged that Delta was still advertising the $1460
fare, but it was not available. My wife
called the Platinum desk (75k mile frequent travelers) to see if they could do
anything…. Nada.
I went online as they were still advertising it. I chatted online with a Delta agent, Too Bad,
So Sad. Well those were not her exact
words.
I called the Diamond Desk (125k mile frequent
travelers). Full disclosure; I have
Diamond Status with Delta, A million Miler and hold their reserve credit
card. I gave them all the information I
shared with you above. After 40 minutes
on the phone with a lovely agent she offered to call me back after revenue management
and inventory management and Air France liaison had a pow wow. She called back 20 minutes later and honored
the $1460 per person fare. So that’s the
story.
Even if you are not an elite member of an airline, you can
still save money. Be smart, do your
research.
Tue, 11JUL
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Sat, 22JUL
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METHOD OF PAYMENT
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AX***********
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$1460.67
USD
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