Discounted Airline Tickets At The Airport
I shared a tip on buying discounted airline tickets at the airport a while back in the ToP Facebook Group. That was after I had driven to the airport to buy 4 roundtrip tickets to New York for a total of around $130. Not a piece, but total for all four. While the prices were already pretty low, I was able to slash the cost even further by using this one simple tip. The only flight buying tip that is guaranteed way to save money on cash flights. While it works every time, the amount you save can vary. I will go through how buying airfare tickets at the airport saves money, which airlines this works for, and best practices when doing it.
Which Airlines Offer Discounts For Buying Their Tickets At The Airport?
Only certain airlines offer a discount for buying their tickets at the airport. No shocker here, it is the discount carriers. That includes some of the following:
- Spirit Airlines
- Frontier Airlines
- Allegiant Airlines
- Sun Country Airlines
- Breeze
This may also include others like Avelo etc. If you have bought discounted airline tickets at the airport for any other airlines please let us know in the Facebook Group.
The full service airlines do not offer a discount. Those include the following airlines:
- Southwest
- Delta
- United
- American
- Alaska
- JetBlue
Why is it only some carriers and not others? That is because low cost carriers (LCC) love to tack on fees where they can. One of those fees is a charge for booking your airfare online. They cleverly hide it in a passenger “usage fee” though. It should be noted that even with these fees they normally beat the full service airlines on price. Why not get your cake and get to eat it to, though?
How Much Money Can You Save Buying Airline Tickets At The Airport?
The answer to the question, how much do you save buying your airline tickets at the airport, is a tricky one. That is because it depends on the route, and even the flight at times. The fee associated with this can even vary some depending on the cost of the flight. I will say that I save over $20 per person, each way, on average. That is a total savings of $40+ per person for a round trip, or $160+ on average for my family of 4.
Can You Tell How Much You Will Save Before Heading To The Airport?
The nice thing is you can figure this out before heading out to the airport to buy your ticket. You wouldn't want to drive all the way out there to buy a ticket only to save $10 after all, would you? I'll get into how you can try to be as efficient as possible in a bit though.
If you do a dummy booking online when you get to the final page you can figure out how much you will save for each. They don't always make it easy though. Here are some screen shots for a few of the airlines and where to check.
Frontier Airlines
The nice part of Frontier Airlines is you can check out the price in your cart after getting through the first screen. It is nice to not have to fill in any passenger information etc. to be able to see your savings for your booking. Once you click on the cart, scroll to the bottom just under Extras. There you will see a tiny (+) next to Taxes and Carrier Imposed Fees, click that. You will then see this box and the Carrier Interface Charge is what you are looking for. This one is $23, per person, per way for this flight.
Spirit Airlines
Spirit Airlines is a little bit more annoying if you want to figure out how much discounted airline tickets at the airport can be. That is because you need to get all the way to the payment screen to see what the Passenger Usage Fee is. For this flight it was $22.99 per person for the one way flight. For a family of four, that is a savings of $91.96 one way, or potentially $183.92 for a round trip booking.
Allegiant Airlines
Allegiant is another one the makes it easy to check the fee to book the flight online. I was able to pull it up after entering the flight details and then checking my cart. Once you check the cart just select the Airline Fees section to see the Carrier Usage Charge. It seems like theirs is usually $22 per person, per segment. For a non-stop round trip flight that would be a savings of $44 per person for buying airline tickets at the airport.
Connections Are Not Twice As Nice
Here is a real kick in the teeth. They will charge you this fee PER SEGMENT. Take a look at this Frontier Airlines flight for a Detroit to Las Vegas to Orlando ticket.
Did you notice that it is double the charge above? That is because they charge you $23 per segment, or connection. Just like how some award programs charge a price per segment of a flight (cough British Airways cough). If you have a connection that means the discount you get by buying your airfare at the airport is going to balloon upwards.
Best Practices For Buying Tickets At The Airport
Now that you have checked the discount for buying airline tickets at the airport, and decided it was a worthwhile endeavor, there are two other things you will want to do before heading out. You will want to have your purchase all lined up for the agent. That is for accuracy sake and also because they act like you are pulling fingernails by asking to buy a ticket. This is another reason why you will also want to time your arrival at the airport properly.
Type Everything Out
The first thing you will want to do is have everything lined up for the airline employee. This would include the following:
- Flight date
- Time of departure
- Flight number
- Then list off each passenger
- Their sex
- Their date of birth
- Your email address
- Your cell phone number
I say to type it out so there is nothing inaccurate because of hand writing. At least if your handwriting looks anything like mine!
Even with doing this, you will want to double check the tickets they give you before you leave the desk. They still mess up the spelling of someone's name about half of the time in my experience, because they are rushing or just not paying attention. I think it is all a game to get you to not come to the airport to buy your discounted airfare. But, more on that in a future article.
Plan Your Visit
The other thing you will want to do is time your visit to the airport. You don't want to get stuck behind a long line of checked baggage for a flight etc. I try to get there about 45 minutes before a flight departs so they have already worked through the baggage. You also don't want to show up after the flight leaves because they may close the counter until the next flight. Or, at least that is what they may tell you to avoid selling you the ticket.
You can check Flight View, or another similar program, to see when the airline has flights the day you visit. You can also hop in the line when you are already at the airport before another flight, or when you return from a trip and are at the airport.
Discounted Airline Tickets At The Airport: ToP Thoughts
Hopefully this guide on buying discounted airline tickets at the airport helps you save some money in the future. If you follow these steps it should save you some time as well. We like to work smarter, not harder, around here at ToP after all! I do wish that the airline employees would be less of a sourpuss when trying to buy the tickets at the airport. If they don't want to sell them then tell their management not to charge the junk fee. People would gladly book them online for free. They won't do that though, since most people don't know what you now know and pay the higher cost.
If you have ever bought discounted airline tickets at the airport to save money, be sure to share your experience in the ToP Facebook Group.
