Rick Seaney, here, CEO of FareCompare.com. I’m often asked, When’s the best time to buy cheap airfares? I have some answers and I think some of them will surprise you…

Daredevils Welcome

First of all, the best time to buy is specific to the cities you’re traveling from and to (we call them city-pairs).

Secondly, how do you feel about taking risks?

That’s right! Purchasing airline tickets is very similar to playing the stock market; there are normally only a few perfect opportunities a year to make a great buy.

And when it comes to buying a plane ticket, most people I speak to have more than a slight pang of anxiety just before hitting that button that dings their credit card because, well, they know once they board the plane, they may find out their seat mate got a much better deal.

3-Major Components of an Airline Ticket Purchase

This is a no-brainer. Take a look:

1. Air Fares
2. Flight Schedules
3. Airline Cheap Seat Inventory

The trick is, getting all 3-of these components in alignment to get the very best travel deals. Lets talk about each of these components individually first, and note that I’m limiting my comments to U.S. and Canadian air travel.

Air Fares Amassing and Distributing Prices

90% + of all purchased air fares in the U.S and Canada are “filed” by the airlines continuously each day to a clearinghouse in Washington, DC called ATPCO (Airline Tariff Publishing Company).

ATPCO was originally a government agency until deregulation in the late 1970’s. It is now owned by several dozen airlines and acts as the distribution hub for over 60-million air fares filed worldwide.

Each airline files their air fares continuously during the day to ATPCO, where those fares are aggregated and distributed to all “subscribers” at specific times (subscribers include the airlines and global distribution systems which power online agencies such as Expedia, Travelocity and Orbitz). This fare distribution occurs on weekdays at 10am, 12:30pm and 8pm Eastern Time; on weekends, it occurs just once, at 5pm.

The airlines and online agencies then load these fares onto their booking systems within 2-6 hours. These air fares are filed in a price ladder (lowest-priced ticket to highest). This price ladder allows the airlines the flexibility to control the price they will sell a particular seat for. This price range can be quite startling: a gap of over $1000 from lowest to highest is not unusual. Obviously, the goal is to sell as many of the highest priced seats that consumers are willing to buy. This is where the black magic of who gets the cheapest price for a particular seat comes into play.

Air Fares Dozens of Prices a Day for the Same Seat

There are normally several dozen airfare price-points in a particular city pair. The fares include 20+ rules which also allow the airline flexibility on restricting the lowest price seats. These rule restrictions include: passenger type, day/time, seasons, flight restrictions, advance purchase, minimum stay, maximum stay, fare combinations, surcharges, travel periods and sales restrictions. This means a particular seat can be sold at dozens of different prices each day!

Farecompare.com is one of the handful of “subscribers” worldwide to this raw air fare & rule information, and our unique technology processes these air fares faster than anyone else, hours before the fares are loaded on the ticket booking sites, and hours before the airlines themselves make these fares known. And we at FareCompare distribute this information to the consumer, immediately!

Flight Schedules Constant Changes

An airline flight schedule is the complete set of all flights and times that an airline operates an airplane, or shares that operation with another airline (codeshare).
The bulk of all flight schedules are filed by the airlines with OAG (Official Airline Guide) and Innovata (a data collection, processing and distribution company) which act as the distribution hub to booking sites.

Additionally, the booking sites get instant flight update notifications from the airlines each day, so that last minute issues (cancellation, mechanical failures, etc) can be posted immediately.

A typical flight-information record includes the maximum seat-count, cabin information, and decisions on which inventory buckets (i.e., classifications) can be sold for which seats on the plane.

Airplane Seat Inventory the Key Variable

Inventory is the key variable in the quest for the best price and is ultimately controlled by the airline. The airline has sophisticated systems that use historical models and current real-time sales information to decide how many seats they will sell at a particular price point on a particular flight at a particular point in time. This is called yield management and it is a very powerful tool the airlines use to maximize profit.
It helps airlines respond when quoting/booking sites ask, “Will you sell me this seat at this price, and if not, what price will you sell it to me for?”

The answer to this question, in theory, can be different every time you ask it. That’s right every time you ask it. You see, each agency or shopping-site could get a different answer because one of the variables that yield-systems use to make a sell decision is “Who is requesting this info?”

Now you know why consumers get so frustrated when shopping for air travel and why you can try 3-5 different sites before making a decision. But, theres really only one site you need: FareCompare.com.’

So When IS the Best Time to But That Ticket?

Using the information and tools found at Farecompare.com, you don’t have to stumble upon a good deal, you can find it. Go to the site; we have lots of how-tos and simple, non-geek information to help you in your quest.

Then, after you’ve done the simple research, go ahead, ding your credit card with confidence; you’ve just made a knowledgeable and highly informed decision.