Online Travel Booking and Bidding Agencies - Booking domestic and int'l separately & lowestfare vs onetravel

I'm currently in the midst of planning a trip from Raleigh, NC to Armenia in first part of October. The cheapest fares I've found for the itinerary I'm looking for (RDU to EVN on 10/8 and return on 10/18) are running right at $950 on lowestfare.com and onetravel.com.

However, if I book the domestic and international legs of the flight separately on the same site, as two round trips, the price is about thirty bucks or so cheaper (Delta from RDU to JFK and Aeroflot from JFK to EVN). Is there any reason not to go ahead and schedule the flight as two separate round trips? It's kind of strange, since the combined fare originally was just under $900, and then went up suddenly w/o any change in the underlying fares.

I'm sure this is kind of a newbie question, but this is all pretty new stuff to me.

Also, does anyone have any experience with either lowestfare or onetravel to recommend one over the other? Both are considerably cheaper for this flight than anyone else I've found (including regular agents I've called), and there's only five or ten bucks difference between them.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks!

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by TimeLord_mbw:
...if I book the domestic and international legs of the flight separately on the same site, as two round trips, the price is about thirty bucks or so cheaper...Is there any reason not to go ahead and schedule the flight as two separate round trips?</font>

Yes, there would be a reason. If you have 2 separate tickets/itineraries and your first flight (either outbound or returning home) is late and causes you to miss your connection (on the separate ticket), you could be out of luck . The airline on your connecting flight would have no obligation to accommodate you.

I don't know if this would be an issue or not, but would the airline check you in for the 'connecting' flight at the first airport and be willing to forward your luggage to your ultimate destination?

If a check-in is required at each airport, this could also cause a problem if you have checked luggage.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by wideman:
Yes, there would be a reason. If you have 2 separate tickets/itineraries and your first flight (either outbound or returning home) is late and causes you to miss your connection (on the separate ticket), you could be out of luck . The airline on your connecting flight would have no obligation to accommodate you. </font>

Makes sense, and probably worth the diff in price. Frankly I'd rather not think about the possibility of missing the flight out of New York; the next flight would be at least a whole day later. http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/eek.gif But if that were to happen (and it were Delta's fault), then I suppose I would expect them to make arrangements to get me on the next available flight out, even thought it is on a different carrier?

The upside (re: baggage) would be that the Delta flight is scheduled to arrive at 4:30 and the aeroflot flight doesn't leave until 8:00, so that would, theoretically, leave a good three hours to take care of rechecking baggage and getting checked in to the next flight. The really good news being that no matter which way I go, both Delta and Aeroflot arrive and depart at the same terminal (3).

Anyway, thanks for the advice; I'll probably go ahead and buy the tix together. My other option is to drive to Dulles, where Aeroflot has the exact same schedule, but I'm not sure if saving $150 and avoiding JFK are worth driving 300 miles.

Couldn't resist replying as this is what I'm up to myself right now. What I have done so far is call the first airline and ask some questions. They were quite helpful and suggested when I make the connecting arrangements to tell the other airline what I'm trying to accomplish and schedule at least a couple hours apart. Then ask them if they have a baggage agreement with the other airline your considering so when you checkin they will book your luggage to your final destination. I'm doing this to save $300/ticket x4, not sure if $30 would be worth it.