Too early to book or ok to wait?????

[RN7997]

We are sailing on the AOS April 1, 2006. We are joining a larger group onboard but there will be 6 of us traveling together. Last week as I was searchong airfare I found seats as low as 363.00 pp from Philly to San juan. This week I am finding seats at 303.00 pp. I know it seems like a good rate, but i was hoping to wait till December or January to book. Would this be foulish of me. Do prices go down/up/stay same??? I checked seat availability and on the outbound and return there is more than half of the plane still available.

[Globaliser]

I checked seat availability and on the outbound and return there is more than half of the plane still available.

A word of warning: This is not a good guide as to how full the flight is, or even whether the flight is sold out. Not all passengers with tickets get seats pre-allocated, and not all seats are available for pre-allocation. In any case, the number of seats on the chart will not give any clues as to when or by how much fares will go up or down if you do not buy now.

[wrp96]

April 1st is smack dab in the middle of prime Spring Break season, i.e. popular cruising time. On Sunday there is at least one if not two other ships docking in San Juan that day, plus all the passengers that came in on the three ships the day before and waited to leave. If you wait too long there may not be seats available or inexpensive seats available especially if you are needing to travel day of cruise.

 

Even the higher fare you mentioned sounds like a good fare to San Juan. I personally would jump on it especially since you are needing seats for 6 people.

 

And Globaliser is correct. Just because the seating chart shows seats available does not mean there are that many tickets left unsold. Most people do not get seat assignments when they book, especially if they booked in a group. Many airlines will stop assigning seats after so many seats are assigned, and then require everybody else to get seats when they check in.

 

If you do decide to wait, don't wait any later than early January. Cruise lines start booking their seats for all their cruise air passengers at 60 to 90 days out. Once they start booking, all those seats you see will be gone.

[wrp96]

One more thing fares usually go up and not down, especially for high travel times like the holidays and spring break.

[jimc_usa]

We are sailing on the AOS April 1, 2006. We are joining a larger group onboard but there will be 6 of us traveling together. Last week as I was searchong airfare I found seats as low as 363.00 pp from Philly to San juan. This week I am finding seats at 303.00 pp. I know it seems like a good rate, but i was hoping to wait till December or January to book. Would this be foulish of me. Do prices go down/up/stay same??? I checked seat availability and on the outbound and return there is more than half of the plane still available.

 

 

I can see $299 on AA but don't think the price will go any lower - time to pull the trigger!!