Online Travel Booking and Bidding Agencies - Why the price difference?

Hi all,
I have just done some price comparisons for a Melbourne, Australia (MEL) /Bangkok (BKK) return fare between Orbitz, Kayak, Expedia and the Thai Airlines web page. The flight/s were for a month's time, economy, non-refundable fare.
Can anyone explain why Orbitz, Kayak, Expedia came in at between A$4500-$5000, and the Thai Airways web page came in at A$1170?
The difference in fares doesn't make sense to me?
Anyone with any ideas?

Thanks.

TKM

After you've double-checked everything on that cheaper fare - quoted in same currency, round-trip, workable schedule, etc. - IMO what you should do is quickly purchase it. Might be a mistake fare, and those are never last very long. Assuming you actually wanted to do the trip, as opposed to just browsing.

I'm assuming your "A$" means Australian dollars? Any chance the Thai one was in US dollars?

Were they all talking about the same trip? Same airline, schedule, class, etc.

Romelle

I tried your trip on http://matrix.itasoftware.com with some random dates. Best number was US$606 from JetWay. Followed by US$718 from Malaysia. ThaiAirways was a whopping $4406 !! ????

After you've double-checked everything on that cheaper fare - quoted in same currency, round-trip, workable schedule, etc. - IMO what you should do is quickly purchase it. Might be a mistake fare, and those are never last very long. Assuming you actually wanted to do the trip, as opposed to just browsing.

I actually want to do the trip, and I was comparing "apples with apples", but the disparity in fares had me in two minds.

I'm assuming your "A$" means Australian dollars? Any chance the Thai one was in US dollars?
No, I made sure all fares were in $A.

Were they all talking about the same trip? Same airline, schedule, class, etc.
Definitely the same trip. I entered MEL-BKK return for the same dates. Some sites came up with 1, 2 or in one case 3, stops trip options.

I tried your trip on http://matrix.itasoftware.com with some random dates. Best number was US$606 from JetWay. Followed by US$718 from Malaysia. ThaiAirways was a whopping $4406 !! ????
That's my point. Taking Thai Airways for example, the fare from their webpage came in at A$1170, but the exact same flights, class, date, time, everything came in at over A$4500 through the major online booking options like Orbitz, Kayak, Expedia. I just can't work out why would there be such a difference?

Thanks for your response.

TKM

Possibly a fare that is only available for sale on the TG website... without the fare info hard to tell...

Hi all,
I have just done some price comparisons for a Melbourne, Australia (MEL) /Bangkok (BKK) return fare between Orbitz, Kayak, Expedia and the Thai Airlines web page. The flight/s were for a month's time, economy, non-refundable fare.
Can anyone explain why Orbitz, Kayak, Expedia came in at between A$4500-$5000, and the Thai Airways web page came in at A$1170?
The difference in fares doesn't make sense to me?
Anyone with any ideas?

Thanks.

TKM

It would make sense for thai to sell cheaper on their own sites rather than any tpi to save on comissions etc etc Also as others have suggested might just be a fare error! buy buy buy!

It would make sense for thai to sell cheaper on their own sites rather than any tpi to save on comissions etc etc Also as others have suggested might just be a fare error! buy buy buy!

Bought, bought, bought!

Thanks all.