Budget Travel - Student discount Travel Websites

I have tried a couple sites giving discounts. I have the international student id card. ive bought tickets from studentuniverse.com and checked statravel and a couple others. i found the best deal on studentuniverse. but the one thing i dont like about them is you do not get your full mileage credit, only 250 miles per segment on nwa. is this the norm for student discount prices?

mitch

When I fly the US Shuttle with a studentuniverse fare I have never had a problem getting full miles.

Being a student myself, I use STA-Travel quite frequently and the answer for them is, it depends on the airline, into which booking class the student fare books. On United, for example, their intercontinental fares are usually in W class, so full miles, if credited to UA or US, 50% if credited to LH etc. Lufthansa books student fares in V, US in S or W, BA into some class that earns only 25%, haven't tried anybody else yet.

I'm buying most tickets at STA in Germany, and on their webpage statravel.de you can actually see the booking class of the ticket...

I only found that STA Travel (or probably the better term is their student fares) are not necessarily the cheapest, so if you know when you want to fly and are not going to change the date, go with a regular ticket, whereas if you want flexibility, the student tickets are great.

Hope that helps,
David

read those restrictions REALLY carefully.. almost all give miles within the US/CAN/MEX but almost none give miles intercontinental.

need to be creative.. had to credit tix from LAX-NRT-SHA to AS since NW only gave me 250miles PER SEGMENT :mad: either way.. i had status on AS so it worked out.

When I bought AA MIA-MAD-MIA with student advantage I got 100% of the miles.

i posted just to make people aware that this happens sometimes. i try to fly nw as much as possible, but when i looked at the fine print after i found this out, there are different airlines that have different policies. just keep in mind if you are a budget traveler trying to get miles and points, that this does happen.

i posted just to make people aware that this happens sometimes. i try to fly nw as much as possible, but when i looked at the fine print after i found this out, there are different airlines that have different policies. just keep in mind if you are a budget traveler trying to get miles and points, that this does happen.

Actually the fine print for most of those student travel sites is pretty inaccurate. I used to buy student tickets a few years ago, and despite listing certain airlines as non-miles earning, I found that they all did.

Student Universe told me that NW tix only got the 250m/segment... STA said i get full miles and bought through them... only got the 250m/segment.. YMMV of course, but still.. just keep an eye out. Air France and Delta seem to be very good about full miles on youth tix.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but do most student discount tickets have longer stays allowed and easier terms for changeing the date?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but do most student discount tickets have longer stays allowed and easier terms for changeing the date?

Don't know about other sources, but if you get the STA-Travel Blue Ticket, it is valid for 12 months and changes are $25. However, this ticket is only offered by a few airlines, I know of BA and Qantas.

A STA-Travel agent told me, that there are seperate contracts between airlines and the local, i.e. country-specific, STA agency.

For tickets I bought in Germany I had the following rules:
[carrier, route flown, booking class, student discount, penalty]

LH, Germany - US, any (I believe you can pick any fare V or higher for 12months stay), 10% off regular fare + open return, EUR100 changes after that

UA, Germany - US, W, special fare + 1 change of return flight free, EUR100 after that

BA, Germany - US, ??(one of those that earn 25%), regular fare but any change (routing and/or date) $25

all of these tickets had a maximum stay of 12 months.

Oh, and one important restriction: Usually you can only get student fares originating in the country you are buying the ticket.

Feel free to add to this, maybe we can have some kind of collection of all available student fares/websites with pro and cons...

David

Disclaimer: I don't work/am affiliated with STA-Travel, they are just the most conveniant TA in Germany for me... :)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but do most student discount tickets have longer stays allowed and easier terms for changeing the date?

Student tickets may not always be cheaper than a public fare and in some cases are more expensive but the main benefits are that they are generally more flexible with regard to date changes and tickets are valid 12 months. In some cases baggage allowance is 30kg but this depends on the carrier, as is the ability to earn miles (for example SQ student fares are mileage accruable whereas VS' are not).

With STA you'll also find that there are extras to pay for as well, such as an airline failure insurance charge. If you shop around, you'll often find cheaper public fares if you forego the flexibility.

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With STA you'll also find that there are extras to pay for as well, such as an airline failure insurance charge.
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I'm curious: Is this a UK specific charge to protect you in case an airline goes belly up?



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If you shop around, you'll often find cheaper public fares if you forego the flexibility.
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As mentioned before, I fully agree with that one.

David

I'm curious: Is this a UK specific charge to protect you in case an airline goes belly up?


Don't know if other countries have a similar charge, but yes, that is what it is. Some agents charge this, others don't. It's about £5.

Don't know if other countries have a similar charge, but yes, that is what it is. Some agents charge this, others don't. It's about £5.

Interesting, I know that there's a law in Germany that if you book a whole tour, you have to get an insurance against/for the tour operator going into bancruptcy, but didn't think it extended to buying "flight only" - at least I don't remember being ever charged for it...
That is, if it is not hidden in the various Taxes and Fees :rolleyes:

David

It's not mandatory in the UK to purchase an airline failure insurance fee when buying flights or as part of a package, rather some agents impose this fee to make more money.

Anyone have any recent experience with international AA tickets, StudentUniverse, and mileage accrual? I haven't purchased an int'l ticket from them since April 2004. That flight did earn miles. They say on their website that int'l AA flights do not earn miles, and I can't remember if that's what they've always said (and it's not true) or if this is a new policy (as AA seems to be cracking down on mileage earning on cheap int'l tickets within the last year or so).

Called them. Seems to be a new policy that no miles can be accrued on int'l AA flights. Darn.

I haven't booked with them in a while because it's seemed like their prices have been higher than AA.com's. But they have an interesting new feature called Go Deals:
http://forums.studentuniverse.com/phpBB2/viewforum.php?f=21

Every day they post a new destination and a discount code that is good for 24 hours. It usually seems to be $25 for a domestic city, $75 for a European city, $100 for an Asian city. Not a bad deal at all (except for the miles).

i know there are some elite budget travelers who are also students. i may be wrong on this, but what would happen if lets say a Platinum memeber or the equivalent bought on a student site like this, would you still get the upgrade? even though its a highly discounted fare?