Less Traveled Path

Ever since I knew I was going to the Beijing Olympics this August, I have been researching travel options. I had no idea it was going to be such an ordeal for 5.5 months looking into options like side trips and land tours and then deciding against them. In the end, I got a sweet cheap airfare deal. I paid $1307 a person for a better itinerary than what was being quoted for $1818 to over $2100 by most travel agents (over 28% in savings!). I realized that the trick was… knowing what to look for.

I’ve shared annoyances about looking for Olympics airfare a few times. I contacted no fewer than ten travel agents.

My preferred itinerary: Flexible departure from SF, fixed dates for Beijing (my friends had already booked hotel rooms for the entire group), return to SF as soon as possible after Beijing (work beckons).

I found out about the All Asia Pass ($1099 for Hong Kong plus two other cities, $500 summer surcharge, $300 Beijing surcharge, not including taxes) and considered that, only almost every travel agent I found doesn’t book that pass despite Cathay stating that travel agent can book it (you can’t book it yourself). It turns out that the process for travel agents is so complicated that they don’t do it, or like STA Travel, they charge a processing fee for it. I’m now convinced that it’s just a marketing ploy for Cathay Pacific which makes me dislike them even more; a travel agent was in disbelief about how difficult it was to find someone who would book the Pass.

I booked my tickets through Cathay Pacific’s website (still can’t beat their airfares despite disliking them) and did the following to reduce my costs:

• Avoided flying Friday, Saturday, or Sunday which adds on a weekend surcharge
• Planned for one stopover in Hong Kong instead of two. Cathy’s hub is in Hong Kong so one stopover (stay longer than 24 hours) doesn’t add to the price of the fare, although two stopovers do.
• Went through all the acceptable combinations for flights and observed the difference in pricing based on the fare class showing on the itinerary confirmation page. I then kept the selections for the cheaper fare classes. (Restricted Economy (M) seems to be one of the lowest fares)

I ended up with an even better itinerary than the quotes I received; the travel agent I was going to go with priced out an itinerary that had me returning back to Hong Kong after midnight which meant dealing with either a 14 hour layover, or trying to get into Kowloon late at night (spending $35-$45 USD for a taxi instead of the $4.25 USD for public transportation). I learned from the agent that in general full flights might open up on Sundays because many travel agents don’t work on Sundays and seats can only be held for 24 hours.

I’ve spent countless hours on this and at some point as I was contacting travel agents (mainly emailing) I was thinking if I would’ve saved time and money if I followed Ramit’s advice on outsourcing inspired by Tim Ferriss’ 4-Hour Workweek. In any case, I realized that travel agents don’t really have the best deals and to my surprise some didn’t even respond to my email request for a quote. And some couldn’t even deal with slight complexities like comparing quotes for a trip with and without a side visit to another destination. Admittedly, I am trying to travel during the Olympics and the tickets are in high demand, but I had expected that this is what travel agents are for. In the end, if you’re willing to put in just a little more time and effort into it, you can cut out the middle person and get a great deal. In other words, do it yo’self.

Travel Agencies I looked into:

• Paciasia Travel – paciasia.com – Called them, they asked me to email proposed itinerary. Very quick to respond although there were some communication issues over email.
• STA Travel – statravel.com – Took three business days to give me a quote, will do the All Asia Pass with a $75 processing fee.
• World Travel Warehouse – worldtravelwarehouse.ca – Thought they could give me a better deal than the All Asia Pass, dropped the ball a little bit in getting back to me but was extremely apologetic about it, couldn’t find a competitive fare and can’t book All Asia Pass because they’re in Canada.
• Lassen Tours – lassentours.com – Slow at responding.
• GatewayLAX – gatewaylax.com – Quote was high because they required booking separate trips.
• Friend’s mom – Friend hadn’t given me contact information for his mom by the time I wanted to buy, though his mom does the All Asia Pass.

The following places I never heard back:

• Classics Tour – Called them, they asked me to email them desired itinerary.
• International Travel Network – itncorp.com
• SuperTime Travel
• B. Usman