Summer's nearly over—make holiday travel plans now

Summer's nearly over—make holiday travel plans now Read Post

Family travel tips

Summer's nearly over—make holiday travel plans now

You might still be enjoying the last bit of summer, wearing flip-flops, swimming with the kids, and barbecuing in the backyard. Christmas probably isn't on your mind—but it should be if you want to hop on a plane this holiday.

If you want a good fare, or even a seat, now's the time to start researching and maybe even buying tickets.

Start researching fares. It's smart to start tracking air fare prices now and then when a good deal comes up you'll know it.  If you saw a $500 round-trip in early August and then that same flight dips down to $300 in September, you'll know to grab that ticket. Sites such as Bing, Yapata and FareCompare can help you track prices and will even send alerts when a ticket price goes down.

Buy after Labor Day. Ticket prices often go down after the three-day weekend holiday. If you see a good price, buy it—especially if you want to visit a popular destination such as Disney World or Hawaii. Flights going to these places fill up fast and prices are likely to only go up. With less popular destinations, you might have some time to shop around and wait to see if prices dip.

Book tickets with frequent flier miles now. Airlines release a limited number of seats that can be purchased with frequent flier miles and they go fast. If you want to go to Hawaii on miles, you're probably already too late, but you can still score seats on less popular routes.

Photo: gracey / Morgue File

Read More

Don't forget to sign your kids up for frequent-flier programs

Don't forget to sign your kids up for frequent-flier programs Read Post

Budget Tips

Don't forget to sign your kids up for frequent-flier programs

It's a huge mistake so many parents make--they sign themselves up for the airline frequent flier program but they never take the time to fill out the forms for their kids.

Yes, it's a hassle, but you should take the time because you don't want to throw miles out the window.

My kids recently became members of Virgin's Elevate program and at first I tried to sign them up online. But the system wouldn't allow me to do it and it wasn't clear why. I called customer service and the problem was that you can use only one email and I was using the same email for my account, and trying to use the same one for theirs. They're only 5 and 7 so they don't have email addresses.

And so I had to get them email addresses...sounds like a lot of work but they're already flown Virgin three times and they're on their way to a free flight.

Read More