Consumers urged to book now for Christmas flights
Customers planning to travel at Christmas and New Year should book immediately to get the best fares, according to a new survey by travel search engine momondo.co.uk
Its Annual Flight Study, in which is analysed 13.2 billion flight prices on 100 most popular routes, found the cheapest fares were available 56 days before departure.
Momondo claimed these fares were up to 28% cheaper than the average paid.
“This means the early days of November are the best time to book flights for Christmas and New Year holidays,” it said.
Lasse Skole Hansen, momondo’s spokesperson, added: “Besides the best time to book, in our Annual Flight Study we also found that prices can vary hugely depending on the day and time of the departure, with the cheapest fares typically found on Tuesdays and the most expensive on Saturdays.
“The average flight cost difference between these two days of the week is 11%.”
For the past two years, momondo’s data showed that the cheapest tickets could be found 53 days in advance, but this year the data revealed that the cheapest tickets are to be found 56 days before departure.
Fares are likely to be most expensive on the date of departure.
Momondo also found that it’s usually more expensive to fly in the morning and in the afternoon before 3pm; Tuesday is generally the cheapest day to fly and Saturday the most expensive and it’s usually to fly in the evening, between 6pm and 2am.
Linsey McNeill
Editor Linsey McNeill has been writing about travel for more than three decades. Bylines include The Times, Telegraph, Observer, Guardian and Which? plus the South China Morning Post. She also shares insider tips on thetraveljournalist.co.uk
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