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Last Minute Holidays
Sometimes the best holidays
you can have are the ones that weren't actaully planned for or expected.
There are many reasons why this can be the case. Firstly, nice unexpected
surprises at the last minute are often more joyous than the dissapointment
that can accompany "getting yourself built up" for an occasion
only to find when you finally get there, it doesn't match up to all
your hopes and expectations. A last minute holiday is the perfect pick-me-up
when work and family life is starting to get you down and it doesn't
even need to be an expensive last minute foreign holiday - a short break
for a couple of days to the seaside or to see a London west-end production
will have you feeling miles better in no time at all.
So, if you find yourself with a few days or a couple of weeks to spare,
why not book something at the last minute.
By waiting to the very last minute, there are some exceptional deals
to be found. We all know someone, perhaps a friend, work colleague,
or family member, who has told the tale of booking a last minute holiday
and getting a fantastic deal. I personally booked a holiday two days
before and ended up with a mega cheap deal, a business class seat on
the flight, and a five-star hotel. It turns out that the economy cabin
was full of people who had booked weeks and months in advance so the
only seat the aircraft had for me was in business class. Similarly,
all the usual hotels were full and there was no beds to spare, so they
put me in a five-star hotel only a couple of blocks from the 3-star
hotel I should have been staying in - brilliant!
To understand how this works and to use it to your advantage, you need
to understand how schedule flights and charter flights work (see other
sections of this website). Also you need to be aware that customers
and travel agents tend to play a game of cat and mouse with each other.
The travel agent needs to fill that flight - after all, he's chartered
it from the airline and paid for it so if it goes out half empty he's
losing money. So the travel agent will dangle the carrot in front of
you telling you that if you don't book now, the flight will be fully
booked and you won't be able to get on it. Sometimes they are telling
the truth, but most time their not, so beware! By the time there are
only a few days left to go before the flight takes off, the travel agent
will get nervous if he hasn't sold all his seats on that flight...and
that's when he starts discounting them. And that's when a £500
holiday can be snapped up, by you, for a fraction of that cost.
One word of advice though. When you get your rock-bottom mega-cheap
holiday deal, don't sit beside others on the aircraft or by the hotel
pool and boast about how much you saved on your holiday. The others
will most likely have paid twice what you paid so won't thank you for
it!.
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