Posts Tagged ‘Travel’
Volunteering to take a later flight
On our honeymoon, our flight connection from St. Louis to Seattle was overbooked.
Since our cruise ship wouldn’t leave for another few days, I jumped at the chance to see if we could get some sweet rewards for volunteering to take a later flight.
You see, airlines typically overbook their flights. For one reason or another, some people don’t show up to flights they’ve booked. I don’t know why they don’t, but it’s enough that airlines often sell more tickets than they have seats to ensure a maximum-capacity flight.
When everyone shows up for their flight, airlines typically first ask for volunteers to take a later flight. Sometimes it’s later that day, and sometimes it’s the next day or so.
Airlines try to compensate you for your troubles. You’ll likely receive vouchers for food, a voucher for a future flight with the company (perhaps worth up to $300 or so) and if you have to stay overnight, they might even put you up in a hotel.
When the announcement came over the PA that our flight to Seattle was seeking volunteers to take a later flight, I practically ran over to the ticket counter to put our names on the list.
I forget the exact amount of compensation, but they would put us up at a hotel overnight, we’d get dinner vouchers, and we’d each get a free round-trip flight in the future.
Thinking how great it would be to be able to fly home for free, and considering we had some wiggle room in our travel plans, it seemed like a good idea.
Unfortunately, the airline didn’t need us to take a later flight after all. Enough people didn’t show up, so we made our original flight.
When we go to Florida in a few months, we’ll consider being overbooked volunteers again, so long as the terms are reasonable.
I hope that someday, I’ll be able to get a free flight!
For more on how this works, read this article on About.com. Have you ever been an overbooked volunteer? How did it go?
A dress for a wedding
I just received my wedding dress–er, shall I say, the dress I will wear at a wedding I’m attending in May.
I originally hoped to spend no more than $30 on it. Why, oh why, did I set the bar so high? Was I afraid to fail? Maybe so.
Anyway, I found a summery dress on Target.com that will work just fine. I should be able to wear it throughout the summer, I think.
I first logged on to my Ebates account, which earned me 4 percent cash back (yay, $0.85), lol. I clicked on the "Target" button on Ebates, and was redirected to the Target site.
The dress I chose was on clearance for $11.19. I found a shirt for my husband (I forgot to budget for him…I thought he had something suitable but he didn’t) and added that to my online cart.
With shipping, both items still cost less than $30. More like $27.15.
We’ve now paid for our flight ($398), our share of a vacation rental home ($327), an Entertainment Book ($25), our outfits ($27), and about $30 toward a wedding gift (I’m hoping to put another $30-35 for the rest of the gift on an Amazon gift certificate I might be receiving). Total spent (and paid for) $807.
What’s left to pay for: Food to eat there ($150), parking at the airport ($40), transportation to and from the airport ($100), $50 for fun, and incidental (?). Total left: $340 (I know we can do it for less than that).
I’ve now racked up a whopping $172 in Ebates money, from things I’ve purchased and referrals (Thank you, thank you, thank you!). I’ll get that check in May, and put that toward the trip costs.
Trip to Florida update: Lodging
I promised y’all I’d keep you updated on my travel plans to Florida for my husband’s sister’s wedding.
I do this to help myself remember what we did and how we paid, and possibly to help you get a bargain.
After searching through countless vacation home listings, calling several lovely options, only to find that they had just been rented…we finally found a vacation rental and put a deposit on it. Woo hoo!
Our criteria:
- We wanted it to be on Fort Myers Beach, rather than further inland. Though inland rentals are cheaper, we’d have to drive to the beach daily–an additional expense and hassle.
- It had to sleep at least 7 people. The place we chose happens to sleep 10 people.
- We wanted a place with a private swimming pool. Those are pretty common down there, and it seems like a fun thing to have while on vacation. We probably paid a little more for this property because it has a pool–but we might be able to save a little on areas of paid entertainment.
- It had to have at least two bathrooms and central air conditioning.
- It had to have a full kitchen, so that we can prepare our meals there and not eat at restaurants the entire time.
- We don’t want it to cost a fortune!
In my first post on the trip, I put together some estimates for how much things would cost so we could accurately budget. Well, I under-budgeted the vacation rental by about $100. Whoops.
The place we booked costs $1,100 for six nights. Add on 11 percent tax, cleaning fees, and another fee, we were looking at $1400 total for seven people–or $200 each. Yikes!
I asked the listing agent if they would be willing to pro-rate the price and only charge us for the five nights we’d be staying there. The owner agreed to give us a bargain (somehow, even better than a flat pro-rated deal)– we were only charged $850 for six days and five nights. Wow! Add on the tax and fees, and we’re looking at about $1,140.
Asking for a better rate saved our group $260 –or about $40 per person. Woo hoo!
If they weren’t willing to pro-rate the price, I was going to try another bargaining strategy: Paying in full right away, rather than making installment payments. They’d get all of their money faster, so there might have been an incentive to give us a price break. Since they gave us the pro-rated deal, I decided to be grateful and accept the price.
Still, for my husband and I, that’s $326.57. Or, for the two of us, that would be $65 per night. Find me a decent hotel along the beach at that price including tax (there aren’t any). So, we still got a great deal, even though I under budgeted.
Why did I under budget?
Well, for one, I forgot to include the 11 percent tax and cleaning fees in my estimates. Another, we weren’t sure if we’d have 10 people or 7. It’s looking like seven now, but possibly one more will join us.
Lesson learned: Budget for the entire price–including tax and fees. It’s a significant number!
My budget for the whole trip isn’t blown, though.
I added a 10 percent “I forgot to budget for this” bubble–which was $100.
Our flights were a whopping $2 under budget (yay!).
My Entertainment Book for the area is sure to save us money on restaurants and other things during the trip. It even has a $5 off $50 purchase at the grocery, which we’ll likely use.
Finally, thanks to YOU LOVELY, WONDERFUL READERS, my Ebates account has racked up a whopping $97. I’ll get that in May. $17 of that was from my own purchases/personal bonuses, and the rest of it is from those of you who listed me as a referral and bought something using the Ebates portal. Thank you so much for blessing me!
