Online Travel Booking and Bidding Agencies - Priceline Bidding on Airline Tickets

Does anyone use priceline for bidding on airline tickets anymore. There are very few transactions recorded at biddingfortravel.com. I am under the impression that it is very hard to beat the published fares most of the time. So, when is it worth it? Does anyone use it anymore?

In fact I have never used PL for airline reservations. I helped one person who needed a last-minute ticket several years ago but other than that, never. Your plans have to be extremely flexible (depart and return over something like a 16 hour time frame).

And if you plan ahead, like I do, you can take advantage of short-term fare sales. I routinely fly from MSP to SMF for under $200, something that PL at any given moment probably could never touch, not to mention the convenience of picking my own flight times, earning miles, getting possible upgrades, etc.

...not to mention the convenience of picking my own flight times...

+1. That, for me, is the main reason I would (virtually) never use PL bidding for flights. Departing at a reasonable hour, is normally very important. On a 2 or 3 day trip, there is a big difference between arriving at 2300 on the first day, and then leaving at 0600 on the third day, vis a vis arriving at 1000 and departing at 2000.

I've used priceline twice in the last year for long distance international flights, where there is less variations on departure times. For short domestic flights, the savings may not make sense for the huge variation in departure times and stops.

Example 1: SFO-PEK. Majority of the flights leaving SFO to PEK depart at noon. Got NWA via NRT and saved ~10% off lowest fare.

Example 2: SFO-GCM. First bid came back indicating that the flight will be a red eye and I immediately know will be one of three airlines. Got CO via EWR and saved ~20% off lowest fare.

Thanks. Good to know. Of course the trade off is no FF miles which can be worth more than the savings in many cases.

Thanks. Good to know. Of course the trade off is no FF miles which can be worth more than the savings in many cases.

Definitely - to save 10% on a transpacific fare and forgo all those miles, especially if you are an elite flyer, would make no sense. And you can use a consolidator or a travel agent that uses consolidators and usually save that 10%. Many consolidator airline tickets now accrue miles, allow changes like "normal" tickets and don't have the draconian rules that some consolidator tickets are associated with. The key is doing your homework before purchasing.