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booking a 3 stop flight.

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 Captain Gear 03 Feb 2013
I am about to spend a large amount of money booking a flight from the UK to California, California to Argentina and the Argentina back to the UK.

My dates are end of August leave UK, end of October leave USA, middle of December leave Argentina.

Anyone got any top tips for saving money and the best way to do this.

I'm expecting the flights to cost a bit over £1000 each.

Thanks,
 Jamie B 03 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear:

I'd book it as a London-Buenas Aires return with an American carrier. You'll go via a US hub, which may well be in California, if not book a seperate side-trip ticket from that hub.
 papashango 03 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear:

Quick search on Expedia gives a total price of £1410 for the 3 flights for those dates (with Iberia...)

A bit more for AA or British Airways!

OP Captain Gear 04 Feb 2013
In reply to papashango: morning bump
 Jamie B 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear:

Alternatively, just book a return to California, then a seperate return from there to Buenas Aires when you are in the States.
OP Captain Gear 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Jamie B:

Best I have so far is £1368... reckon I'll get any better?
 john arran 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear:

I've always found dial-a-flight to be very good for this kind of thing. They know the best ways around non-standard flight requests and I think they also have pre-booked better rates on some of the more popular legs.
 Jamie B 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear:

It's a long time since I worked in the travel trade, but my gut feeling is yes you can get better, possibly under a grand. I'm sure that some of the American carriers will offer a LON-BUE return via the states, and for a premium you may even get the California stop-off as part of the ticket.

But you wont get the best prices online for this sort of complex itinerary. Piecing together multi-stop journeys and keeping them within fare guidelines always used to be a real dark art, and possibly still is. A good travel agent with a thorough knowledge of fare structures is far more likely to spot the big savings than a computer is.

Like I say, it's been a while, and I'm not sure who the leaders are now, but I'd guess that there are S. American specialists who will be accustomed to the sort of requests you're making. My advice is to pick up the phone and be prepared to wait while the agent sifts through the possibilities. Too quick a response means they haven't considered everything, but if they are clearly struggling end the call.

Good luck. I'll be genuinely interested to hear how you get on!
OP Captain Gear 04 Feb 2013
In reply to john arran:

Cheers John,

Just spoke to Dial a flight and they sound super helpful and will get back in touch within the hour.
 ianstevens 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear: I did a similar thing with Australia/New Zealand last year; basically you will get a far better price if you go somewhere like dial a flight.

I found my best price at flight centre, and ended up with a mixture of single flights. It took ages to get there/back (relatively) and a lot of time in airports, but saved me about £400. Well worth it!
 Indy 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Jamie B: if you do that it invalidates your visa wavier.
OP Captain Gear 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Indy:
> (In reply to Jamie B) if you do that it invalidates your visa wavier.

Does it?

In 2011 I flew to and from Peru via the US and had no problems with my visa wavier.
 Jamie B 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Indy:

> if you do that it invalidates your visa wavier.

If I/he does what?

 Indy 04 Feb 2013
In reply to ianstevens: sorry we stopped using Flight Centre a good few years ago after they introduced a 2.5% CC surcharge. Have since found Trail Finders excellent in both price (no surcharge) and service.
 Indy 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Jamie B: sorry,you can only use 1 flight ticket per visa wavier SO you can't fly in on a london new York rtn then fly out to say mexico rtn then use the rtn of the original ticket to get you back to London. For that you'd need a full visa. Also all entries/exits have to be via airports you can't come on a plane leave via an overland boarder or vice versa.
Hope that makes sense. It changed our honeymoon plans hhhmmm
 Indy 04 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear: as a transfer? Not as seperate tickets.
 ianstevens 05 Feb 2013
In reply to Indy:
> (In reply to ianstevens) sorry we stopped using Flight Centre a good few years ago after they introduced a 2.5% CC surcharge. Have since found Trail Finders excellent in both price (no surcharge) and service.

Don't pay on a credit card? Or just consider that 2.5% as part of the overall price.
 Banned User 77 05 Feb 2013
In reply to Captain Gear: Just any multi-stop..

1400 sounds pretty good..
 Banned User 77 05 Feb 2013
In reply to Jamie B:
> (In reply to Captain Gear)
>
> It's a long time since I worked in the travel trade, but my gut feeling is yes you can get better, possibly under a grand. I'm sure that some of the American carriers will offer a LON-BUE return via the states, and for a premium you may even get the California stop-off as part of the ticket.
>

I'd be surprised nowadays.. I do a fair amount of mulit-stops to the states.. California alone would set you back the best part of 700-800.. East coast USA is now around £450.
 Banned User 77 05 Feb 2013
In reply to IainRUK: Just looked at Orbitz.com. they have the flights for $2100 (£1300) LHR > LAX > EZE > LHR

Orbitz is normally pretty good.
OP Captain Gear 05 Feb 2013
In reply to IainRUK:

I ended up going with STA Travel, who were the first broke I got in touch with. They were super helpful and super personable.

The price I got was £1204 each. (+ 2% CC fee). These flights are with United and Taca and we get 2 hold bags each, which means we should get away with out any excess luggage charges.

Cheers for all the advice... the guys at dial a flight were very good, but couldn't get anywhere near on price.
 Šljiva 05 Feb 2013
In reply to Indy:
> (In reply to Jamie B) sorry,you can only use 1 flight ticket per visa wavier SO you can't fly in on a london new York rtn then fly out to say mexico rtn then use the rtn of the original ticket to get you back to London. For that you'd need a full visa. Also all entries/exits have to be via airports you can't come on a plane leave via an overland boarder or vice versa.
> Hope that makes sense. It changed our honeymoon plans hhhmmm




is this relatively new? that was exactly how I did it when I went to south america

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