International Airfare Search Tool
October 17th, 2006 Posted in General, Travel bargains, Travel industry
Trying to compare airfare prices from Cleveland to L.A. for different dates is pretty easy these days and checking possibilities from the U.S. to Mexico or the Caribbean is not much worse with visits to two or three sites. Beyond that, however, it’s still a battle to compare international airfares and see what the best options are, across a range of dates.
Travelocity used to have a pretty good tool for it, but they had to disable it after not being able to comply with full tax and fee disclosures. There’s a backdoor way at sister site zuji.com though, according to this entry on the SmarterTravel blog:
Here’s how to make it work for you. Head over to zuji.com and, from the site’s homepage, click on “Other” in the area that reads, “Please select your location from the list below to access the best deals from your local ZUJI website.” Then, select the “Flights” tab and “Flexible date” option. Now you’re in business.
Of course, to keep the DOT happy I should note that zuji.com is not intended for those of us here on U.S. soil. Near as I can tell, though, there’s absolutely no reason why we can’t (or shouldn’t) use it to find the best fares on our international routes.
I ran a few different test scenarios. One to Santiago came up empty from three different departure points, but the others worked out well—including a $486 round-trip flight from London to South Africa and a $258 one from my home town to two different cities in Mexico.
