Hawaii on a Budget -Essential Tip #1- How to Save Money on Airfare

Most everyone wants to save money on the airline ticket. The less money you spend on airfare, the more you have to play with once you get to paradise. The problem of course is the ever rising fuel costs mixed with the two airlines that are no longer in operation (Aloha and TransAmerican) which provided a competitive fare to the islands. Although it is harder now to find "cheaper" airfare to the Islands, it is not impossible. Here are some suggestions :

• Do your homework!! It is work but you can literally save hundreds of dollars by comparing prices. Try http://away.com/ to begin your search. A rule of thumb is to start your search at least a month in advance of your trip so that you can take advantage of buying the ticket 21 days in advance (the standard lower fare). Put in your dates that you want to travel and it will search some of the biggest low priced travel search engines for you. Once you find a fare you can live with, you have two options. You can buy from the search engine (if it allows you to) or go directly to the airline website for purchase. I have noticed that sometimes you save a few bucks by going directly to the airline website,HOWEVER, sometimes a search engine like Orbitz will find a fare for a flight that I cannot find when I go to the airline website (often it is not a non-stop flight but worth the inconvenience).
• If you have done your homework (using the search engines) but still are not happy with the results you can wait for fares to drop. This is a gamble- you need to decide if it is smart to wait or not. You can check http://farecast.com/ to see what their prediction is. This popular search engine will either tell you to wait or buy and ask if you want them to email you when the fare drops. I wouldn't recommend that you trust their predictions completely, you have to use your common sense as well and still be looking around at other sites. They are a good tool to use.
• Your last option, when the above tactics are still not bringing you acceptable prices, is to go to http://priceline.com/ and name your own price. I have used this and have gotten excellent results. For instance, on a flight from SFO to Denver the week before Christmas, I was able to find two round trip tickets on United non-stop flights for 1/2 of what was coming up on my previous searches. Although Priceline will not tell you before you buy the tickets what airline you will fly or what time of the day it will be, they guarantee it will be a major airline and your flight won't be earlier than 6 am or later than 10pm, my flights were mid-morning and early afternoon. They also state they look for non-stop flights first, but worse case scenario is you have only one stop before your destination. Priceline asks you to name your price for your specific trip and then takes your credit card information. If they cannot give you the price you asked for they will sometimes ask you if you want to spend a little more, or they will tell you flat out that they cannot find the price you asked for and you will need to wait a period before they let you try again unless you want to make a change in your dates or price. Your credit card will not be charged if they cannot find the price you requested.