It seems fairly obvious that the cost of living around the world, and particularly in Malaysia, has people feeling the pinch on their economic freedoms. The travel sector sees no exception to that pinch But like anybody else in the world, Malaysians want to see the world. An article from last year by The Star noted that Malaysians still want to travel, willing to spend up to RM6,500 to visit places abroad. So what can we do?
We believe that if you play your cards right and are willing to do a bit of electronic legwork, you can definitely fly out to see the world without breaking your bank. In this article, we show you the tips and tricks you’ll need to get the best of your money, and where you can find cheap tickets to anywhere in the world.
Where to find cheap flight tickets
Leverage airfare comparison websites and apps
One way to find cheaper flights to your destination is to use fare comparison websites, such as Traveloka or Expedia across different airlines to find the best deals towards your destination. Similarly, you can also use apps like Kayak or Skyscanner to find cheap flights. This will naturally incline you to use budget airlines, if your goal is to reduce your flight costs. Low-cost carriers like Air Asia, Firefly and Malindo already cement their position in the market as being budget friendly.
For instance, if you want a cheap flight to Singapore from Kuala Lumpur, Traveloka will show you which flights are the most affordable at the top of their page, which is just above RM435 via Batik as opposed to Malaysian Airlines at RM1,028, as of time of writing. Similarly, a cheap flight to Tokyo from Kuala Lumpur can be as low as RM710 via Batik Air as opposed to Malaysian Airlines’ rates at RM1,384, as of time of writing.
Keep on eye out for deals and discounts
Even so, regardless of which airline you pick, be on the lookout for any deals or discounts that they may have for certain destinations or demographics, such as for children, the elderly, students or even military staff for national carriers. Apart from their own websites, one side to keep abreast of any flash sales or last minute deals is to simply follow airlines on social media platforms, where they may announce such deals.
Be wary of hidden fees
However, you should also be wary of any hidden fees for the airline ticket you’re looking for. Anybody who’s been on AirAsia and Firefly knows that food, drinks, entertainment, printing out a boarding pass and getting to choose the seat you want all cost extra. Some airways even have surcharges for fuel and credit card payments. Some will even try to sneak in flight insurance you’ll have to manually check out of, which is unnecessary if you have your own, and we can show you how to pick a good policy for you too. So keep these in mind when looking for trying to find cheap flights.
Now of course, because nearly all purchases for flight tickets are done online, this naturally
leads to the next step in online bargain hunting, which includes…
Hacks to find cheap flights
Cloak and tracker
One little secret for some airlines or flight comparison sites is sometimes they’ll hike their prices based on your search history or even geolocation. So one method to get cheaper air rates is to simply apply some anonymity to your searches, either by using Incognito Mode on Google Chrome or using a Virtual Private Network app, or a VPN to anonymise your connection.
Keeping an ear out for deals
Another tool you can use to your advantage is alerts and notifications. Some of the airline and airfare comparison websites allow you to set alerts for specific flights. Traveloka for instance, has a tiny green tab at the corner of their flight booking field box on their “Flight” page that allows you to receive messages for when a desired destination becomes available. and you can naturally set notifications for social media posts on airline pages to help you keep an eye out for any deals that might come up.
Plastic, not paper
And last but not least, use a credit card when trying to find a cheap flight. Frequent Flyer Miles and Points on your travel credit card when to get cheaper flights, or at the very least offset the price of an otherwise expensive one.
Travel credit cards specifically are particularly good at this, and the points and bonuses they can offer are specifically engineered to reward travel.You can even use a travel credit card to get a good deal on travel insurance and which the best insurance companies for travel are, which is another debt you can put in your travel expenses overall.
Now all of these tips work just fine on their own if you’ve already got a specific flight and destination in mind, at a specific time and date. But if you were a bit more adaptable with your schedule, you could…
Find cheap flights with flexible dates and routes
Early bird, early worm
Generally, you can find cheap flights if you can keep your future travel times and routes flexible enough to choose ones that are not immediately convenient or flexible. One age-old piece of advice in finding cheap flights anywhere is to simply book well in advance. Airlines will release flights as far ahead as 11 months in advance, and the earlier the flight from your current date, the cheaper the flight. What used to be true is that flights in the middle of the week, say Tuesday or Wednesday, or flights that are early in the morning or late at night, are also usually cheaper.
But that actually seems to depend entirely on the individual airline. Generally, the earlier the cheaper the ticket, but which day is cheaper can ultimately change depending on how many bookings the flights get.
A hop and a skip
Considering alternative routes can also allow you to find cheap flights to anywhere in the world. Airlines will often share planes flying to the same destination if they stop at connecting airports in order to keep the flight full and use economies of scale to drop their prices. This is particularly true if the airline’s home country is on the general way of the destination. This is called a codeshare flight. Codeshares can be a bit confusing to manage, but if your journey doesn’t really need a direct flight, you might be able to find a cheap flight if it’s a codeshare.
Connect the dots
One way to find cheap flights is to simply book separate legs of the trip. It is more convenient and intuitive to have the entire flight booked under the same airline. But if you don’t mind the extra work, you can use apps like Airwanderer or Skiplagged to show you how to find cheap multi city flights, which can either allow you to have visits to multiple destinations, or allow you to book multiple flights on different airlines towards your destination for cheaper overall.
Conclusion
As we’ve seen, there’s a lot you can do to find cheap flight tickets to go anywhere. Just using one of these tips would already make a trip to a far off exotic land practical to even a young adult in this economic landscape on their first job. Use a few or all of them in conjunction and take a few sacrifices of convenient, and suddenly the world’s your oyster. To find more tips to manage your travel costs and necessities, check out some of the other guides to help you find cheap flights and journey plans.
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