Top 3 Ways to Save Money on Student Group Travel

    1     Charters Are Not Cheaper. While it may sound cool to charter your own plane, if you're looking to save money on your group's next travel plans, resist the temptation! When you pay for a private plane, you're not only paying for your trip from New York to Orlando. If the plane is in Dallas, you have to pay for the flight to get your plane to where you can board it! So the hidden secret with charter flights is that you always pay for the "invisible flights" - the flight from whereever the plane was to where you are. The cost is buried in your charter cost. Also, last-minute fuel surcharges can really pack a punch sometimes in the $50,000 range! You may give up some convenience and it may be less attractive, especially with a big group, but your best bet to save a lot of money on your travel is to stick with commercial. At American Tour and Travel, we know there simply is no way in today's environment that a charter flight can be anywhere as cost effective as a properly planned commercial flight depspite what some "experts" claim.

    2     Don't Outbid Yourself! It's always a good idea to shop around a little bit when you're comparing travel plans, however, did you know that the more bids you create in the marketplace, the more expensive you are making your trip? Think about it. You're looking for 50 seats to fly from D.C. to Orlando. One travel agency calls the airlines to get you a quote on a block of tickets for you. Then another agency calls to get you yet another quote. The airlines don't know that each of these calls are on behalf of the same organization, and so they think the demand for the tickets increases, therefore triggering a response in their pricing software to raise the price! You basically create a bidding war with yourself! Airline tickets are based on supply and demand. By articfically creating a demand with multiple price quotes for large blocks of tickets you could be increasing the price you pay! The secret to avoiding that is to pick your travel vendor first. Judge them on their experience and the other qualities you can find on our checklist at americantourandtravel.com, then confidently have them secure your airfare.

    3     More Seats, More Money. It may seem like the more seats you purchase on a plane the better discount you're going to receive, but the little known secret in group travel is that when it comes to airline tickets, that theory works in reverse. When you purchase tickets in bulk, you're forced to not just buy the cheap seats in the back of the plane, but the gradually more expensive seats as well. (Every flight has a set allocation of seats at difference prices.) This is why online searches of airline tickets at places like expedia and orbitz aren't necessarily accurate. If you search for the price of 1 ticket from D.C. to Orlando, that won't reflect the true price of 50 tickets for the same trip! Your best bet is to plan ahead of time, as much as 10 months if you are able. This will allow you to score more of the cheaper seats and lower your price!

A Note of Caution: Learn from a President's Mistake. Planning any trip can be confusing, whether you're planning a trip for 4 or a trip for 400. And while the online booking agents are convenient for most people, you still have to be careful. For example, this is a true story about a client of ours who is a President of a University who asked us to look into purchasing tickets for his family to visit Orlando. We found him a price of around $300 a ticket to travel. He researched himself and found tickets for $129 each. We knew something just wasn't right for him to be able to get that price.. later when we looked into it, we realized that he had purchased one-way tickets by accident! When we factored in the price of a round-trip, added in the taxes, it came out to be more than what we tried to originally offer him! So what's the moral of this story? Make sure you pay attention to what you're purchasing! If you don't see taxes or surcharges or airport fees in the price, you need to factor those costs in, which can range from an additional $30 to $50 a ticket! And make sure you have a way to get home! The large consumer sites can be misleading, even for a University President. Group travel planning simply isn't for do-it-yourselfers. We hope you've enjoyed these travel secrets from American Tours & Travel.They are the product of our more than 40 years of experience in coordinating group travel. When you're traveling with your group, the most important aspect of the trip is being able to enjoy yourself. You can get that with American Tours & Travel. We sweat the details so you don't have to. Most of our clients find that our expertise and buying power save enough money compared to doing it yourself that it's like getting our service for free. If we can help you in any way with your next group travel plans or you know someone who could use our services, please call us at 800.243.4365 or visit our website at www.americantoursandtravel.com.

Want to take advantage of even more travel secrets? The travel coordinators at American Tours & Travel have more than just these four secrets up their sleeves. So click here to start planning your trip today or call 800.243.4365!
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