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When's the best time to book plane tickets to get cheaper flights?

looking for the best deal on airfare, don’t wait until Tuesday. The idea that cheaper seats can be booked when the clock strikes midnight Monday night is just a myth, according to travel app Hopper. That advice is a relic of a former time, says Hayley Berg, Hopper’s lead economist. Back before airlineshad machine-learning revenue models, employees would clock out on Fridays, flights would sell over the weekend, and they’d come in on Monday morning and adjust prices if routes weren’t selling well. That usually took a bit of time, and flights were cheaper to book on Tuesday once those adjustments had gone through the system. But this hasn’t been the case in the past 15 years or so, says Berg. Now there is so much dynamic pricing happening and so many fare classes that the lowest price available on a particular route can be found 16 different times in the course of a week,” she says. Berg adds that airline pricing is volatile and happens automatically on computer-based models. To determine if there were any kernels of truth in the Tuesday myth, Berg and the Hopper team looked at every data point for two weeks’ worth of flights along a single route: New York’s JFK to Boston Logan, a popular pairing of business travel hubs served by many major airlines. To do so, she pulled every price offered from the beginning of the year up to the departure dates in September. Berg found that the lowest fare was actually offered every day of the week and most frequently on Wednesdays and Thursdays overall, showing no benefit to waiting until Tuesday to book a flight. Busting the Cache-Clearing Myth Another common legend is that airlines and search engines use cookies to track your shopping activity to keep increasing the price you see rather than “allowing” you to find a deal. Clearing your browser history, believers say, can result in more favorable rates. “That’s just not true,” says Berg, who insists that airlines aren’t out to get customers. If someone does a search for a flight in the morning and it’s more expensive in the evening when they search again, that’s likely because the fare bucket of lower-priced seats had sold out by then, not because it increased just for them as a direct result of multiple searches. So, What Works? So now that the Tuesday myth has been busted once and for all and you can leave your browser cache alone, here are a few things that still do work to lower the cost of those dreadfully expensive airfares—in addition to the old standbys of booking on points and miles and being flexible about a layover.

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Vistara To Operate Daily Non-Stop Flights Between Delhi & Bali From Dec 1

Vistara will start daily non-stop flights between Delhi and Bali, starting December 1, 2023. This makes Vistara the only airline offering direct connectivity between the two cities currently. Vistara will be deploying its A321LR aircraft, with a three-class configuration, giving its customers the option to fly in Business, Premium Economy, or Economy cabins when travelling on the route. Bookings for the flights are being progressively opened on all channels, including Vistara’s website, mobile app, and through travel agents. Bali has become an increasingly sought-after holiday destination for Indians due to its accessibility, proximity, and hassle-free visa on arrival facility. Commenting on the introduction of the new destination, Vinod Kannan, CEO, Vistara, said, “India is the second-largest source of foreign tourists to Bali, and with hassle-free visa-on-arrival , Bali remains one of the preferred holiday destinations for Indians, besides being popular for MICE traffic. Additionally, as the second largest trading destination for India in the ASEAN region, Indonesia exhibits great potential for business travel as well. We are delighted to be the only airline offering direct connectivity between Dehi and Bali. We are confident that customers will appreciate having the option to travel on India’s finest full service airline on the route.”

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Direct flights to Malaysia from Ahmedabad airport this winter

If you've shortlisted Malaysia as your Christmas destination this year, you're in for some luck. A direct flight to Malaysia is in the offing from December 1 from the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International (SVPI) airport in Ahmedabad, according to top sources. With the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) announcing the winter schedule, some 40 new outbound flights will be added from the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International (SVPI) airport in Ahmedabad, including both weekly domestic and international departures. The winter schedule will be effective from October 28. This will bring the weekly departures from the SVPI airport to 910 compared to 870 in the winter schedule of 2022. Interestingly, the flights have increased this year compared to previous years, despite GoAir flight operations being indefinitely suspended. This time, direct flights to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia will be launched. Malaysian airlines have asked for slots for operating a direct flight from Ahmedabad to Kuala Lumpur for four days a week. This will help enhance connectivity to the South Asian country ahead of the Christmas-New Year holidays and the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit," a source told TOI. The SVPI airport recently added a daily direct flight to Bangkok, Thailand from Ahmedabad. With this, the city airport will operate some 15 international flights to various destinations with 18 airlines. "A direct flight to Malaysia is a welcome move. Direct air connectivity to international destinations is the need of the hour, given the number of business and leisure travellers. Moreover, it will be beneficial as several delegates from the country will arrive for the upcoming Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit (VGGS) 2024. Direct connectivity will also encourage tourists to plan international holidays even over a limited number of days or long weekends," said Virendra Shah, chairman, Travel Agents' Association of India (TAAI) - Gujarat. Currently, the city airport has direct flights to Dubai and Abu Dhabi, Singapore, Bangkok (Thailand), Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi (Vietnam), Muscat (Oman), Kuwait, London (UK), Doha (Qatar) and Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), among others. New direct flights from the city to domestic destinations including Diu, Jaisalmer, Agra, Darbhanga and Gorakhpur are also in the offing. This will take the direct domestic flights to 40, operated by seven airlines. Besides the new destination, the weekly frequency of flights to existing destinations has also gone up.

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Delhi Airport: Two new flyovers inaugurated to reduce travel time from T1 to T3

Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL) inaugurated two new flyovers - Aerocity Flyover and the Parallel Access Road (PAR) flyover - for signal-free seamless transit to Delhi Airport, said DIAl in a statement on Wednesday. The total length of the Aerocity Flyover and PAR Flyover are 800 meters and 600 meters respectively. They will restrict the movement of heavy vehicles on the airport approach road ensuring a seamless transit passage towards and from Delhi Airport. "The two flyovers; Aerocity Flyover and the Parallel Access Road flyover, will help ease the traffic movement to and from Delhi Airport. The Aerocity Flyover, a four-lane one-way flyover constructed at Aerocity metro station junction will reduce travel time from T1 to T3 of the Delhi Airport by making a signal-free movement," the statement read. The flyover commences from in front of Andaz Hotel, Aerocity (West side) terminating short of the Eastern Cross Taxiway, while it ends at Central Spine Road, it added. The Parallel Access Road (PAR) Flyover - a part of a dedicated corridor of two lanes on both carriageways for Cargo Terminal (To and Fro) of the airport - is a flyway close to NH8, the DIAL statement read. The corridor commences close to Hanuman temple and ends near Andaz Hotel, whereby segregating the heavy vehicular movement from passenger vehicles and further helping decongest the airport approach road.

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Air India To Start Non-Stop Bengaluru-Singapore Flights From Oct 22

Air India will launch a non-stop service between Bengaluru and Singapore from October, 22, 2023. The new service will cater to the need of a convenient direct connection between the two cities. AI392 will depart Bengaluru at 2230 hrs to reach Singapore at 0540 hrs the next morning. The return flight AI393 will take off from Singapore at 0640 hrs to land in Bengaluru at 0835 hrs (All Local Time). The flight, operated with an Airbus A321 aircraft, will have a two-class configuration of 170 Economy and 12 Business Class seats and operate four days a week on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays. The new connection will lend a boost to tourism and trade in the two cities and help the leisure travellers, students, and business community. Air India has also enhanced the frequency from Mumbai to Singapore from seven flights a week to 13 flights a week from October 22, 2023. With the increased frequency and commencement of service from Bengaluru, Air India is currently operating a total of 38 non-stop flights to Singapore per week from Delhi (14 flights), Mumbai (13 flights), Chennai (7 flights) and Bengaluru (4 flights) connecting the Merlion City.

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Indians still prefer hotels over homestays

New Delhi: Travellers from tier-I cities are not only spending more on leisure trips but also travelling more compared with their counterparts in tier-II and -III cities, according to a report by global research, consulting, and mergers and acquisitions advisory, Videc. The report, accessed exclusively by Mint, highlighted that homestays still have scope to grow in India. The majority of survey participants (91%) said they stayed in a hotel, while only 10% of them booked all-inclusive packages, with 7% booking homestays, villas or bungalows. Interestingly despite higher airfares, people booked well in advance with 69% of travellers buying tickets over two weeks ahead of departure date, while intercity bus is predominantly a last-minute arrangement. The “Indian Traveler Behavior and Insights Report 2023" found that two-third of travellers travelled in trains, while 43% preferred flights, more so from metros and tier-I cities. Virendra Jain, co-founder of Videc, said in the last two decades, travel has undergone a major transformation in India “With a surge in expendable income, India’s per capita GDP is projected to increase 10x from $460 in 2001 to $4,000 by 2030, so more people are budgeting for leisure travel in their lifestyle spend. India will have a working age population of one billion by 2030. As per reports, this means nearly 25% of global incremental workforce over the next decade will come from India. This means there will be a strong increased consumption power, that will also be reflecting in discretionary spending," he added. While at present, domestic travel has taken precedence, 79% of those surveyed for the report said they were planning a domestic trip. Top international destinations were, as expected, Thailand, the UAE, Singapore and Malaysia, followed by Australia, the Maldives and Indonesia. Surprisingly, travellers from India’s tier-I cities were just as likely to be first-time travellers as those from tier-II. Around 81% of Indian travellers from tier-I cities have either travelled or intend to travel internationally for the first time this year, similar to the 79% from tier-II cities. In contrast, 98% of tier-III city travellers were venturing abroad for the first time, the report said. While travel bookings are gradually moving online, many, nearly half of all the travellers did report that they were still not booking online for one simple reason: that they preferred to pay in cash. There was also a sizable number, 32% of travellers looking to buy the services from a ‘trusted’ offline travel agent. Many were also just not comfortable booking their travel online because of risk of fraud and finding it cumbersome to book their travel online.Indians are yet to shell out a lot to travel though. On an average, travellers across ages said they spent ₹48,000 including airline or rail and bus tickets; lodging; cars and cruises and destination activities for travel over 100 kilometres in the past 12 months. But those in the age group of 45-54 were the highest spenders, exceeding the average at ₹58,000. Yet again, tier 2 city travellers in general spent almost as much for travel at ₹52,000 and ₹ 53,000 respectively. This cost went up dramatically between international and domestic travel. While international travel commanded a rate of ₹1.29 lakh, domestic travel spends were just ₹27,000 for the same set of 1,500 people surveyed. The survey focused on about 1,500 travellers over a month-long period between 1 June and 5 July 2023.

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