I'm sure many know that this is a great site for information, but what about joining? Is anyone a member? I've considered but want to know what I'd be getting into. It seems like a lot of their sales may be on Southwest, judging from the cities, and that doesn't exactly interest me. Regardless, it sure looks like it would be worth it for all the benefits ... can anyone help?

I have wondered the exact same thing!

I doubt Bestfares uses Southwest, as Southwest doesn't typically participate with re-sellers/consolidators. I've heard that a lot of Bestfares exclusive fares are through TWA, although they use other airlines as well.

I've participated in numerous online forums for several years, and Bestfares receives mixed reviews from their members. If you are very creative in your airfare searches, I think more often than not, you can get just as good a deal or better, without having to pay a membership fee.

And I've heard some not so pleasant stories about dealing with their customer service people.

I was a member for a year, but found that when I called to book a "members only deal," it was not available when I wanted to use it, or the cheapest fare was unavailable (but a higher fare could be found). After a year I cancelled my membership because I found that I could find better deals myself. In my opinion, it's not worth the money.

Do a search in FT especially in the BUZZ, GENL TRAVEL or OMNI catagory sections. A wealth of comments reside there. In general most comments are neither nice or nor flattering to the site.

NO!

As I and others have posted here before ... bestfares.com sucks, except for the snooze you lose fares. All of us have probably seen some good fares on there. Members Only fares are usually a crock and mean flying on TWA (Get those fares yourself at lowestfare.com -- no membership fee there!)

Customer service is terrible, back when I was a member I actually had an exchange with Mr. Tim Parsons himself (president) and he was rude himself. My $.02 -- save the $60

The snooze you loose segment and the internet fares page is very convenient. As regards joining the club, I did and was not impressed.

However,I do love the snooze you loose page. And no,its not a SWA outlet,I see more CAL and NWA. And if you notice,certain major cities have the most low fares. One being Dallas.

The website is informative,but I will not be rejoining the Bestfares club.

I joined in February and have taken just one trip on them--it was a TWA fare that was a 3 day advance for $275 vs. $1100 for everyone else. I may look at lowestfares for better prices. The Snooze Alarm deals (visible to the public) are nice if you are waiting for a fare from point-to-point.

By the time you get the publication each month the news is usually old news. But the best deal is that you get about 4 Northwest Airline discount coupons per year to use. Is that worth it, to have to be suject to NW ???

While I have no direct personal experience with Bestfares.com to offer, I would like to bring up the caveat that I understand that airlines do not award frequent flyer miles to itineraries bought on Priceline.com and the like (perhaps Bestfares as well?).

My suggestion is to find a terrific travel agent who really knows the ins-and-outs of ticketing, which involves the agent having a terrific relationship with the airlines as well as yourself. This makes the entire process efficient and satisfying.

Bestfares, airline sites, Biztravel, and the like will, I submit, promote only what they have available to promote, which, as mentioned earlier, precludes carriers such as WN. On the other hand, travel agents have the full range of airline, fare, schedule, etc., options to offer you. Whether you fly certain of those airlines available (such as WN or TZ) is another issue, but being able to make as informed a decision as possible is the leverage with which you empowered when working with a good travel agent.

And let's not forget about personal accountability... how many threads and posts are there in FT about trouble with this-and-that online booking website???

P.S. I am not a travel agent, nor affiliated with the industry... but I have benefitted vastly from having a great travel agent, and while I book off the web often myself, running a fare or itinerary by my agent helps me validate that I am making the best decision and therefore getting the best deal.

[This message has been edited by FQTV (edited 06-04-2000).]

You definitely earn FF miles on tix purchased through BestFares. I earned over 29K miles on a $239 fare on TWA, PDX-BCN.

I have been a Best Fares member for a couple of years now. I am fairly happy with their service. I think it is true that a lot of their negotiated deals are with TWA.

In 1998 Best Fares had a Thanksgiving weekend deal from Knoxville to LGW for $275 RT with double miles on TWA. We had never flown TWA before so they signed us up for their aviators club with a 5000 mile bonus plus double miles to London via St. Louis = free ticket. A $275 RT to LGW was good enough but the double miles was a Best Fares exclusive. The TWA service was certainly nothing special but BestFares.com helped me with this deal which I wouldn't have gotten if I wasn't a member.

I haven't used them lately. They have started charging a booking fee. I have been taking a lot of leisure trips by using other sources such as airline web sites. Another thing I don't like is that Best Fares automatically renew your membership without asking by charging it to your credit card on file. I did join all the Car rental loyalty programs with the stuff they sent. I guess my verdict is they are pretty good though I'd like them a lot more if they made their fairly worthless magazine bi-monthly and dropped the membership fee to about $25/yr.

I was a member for a year and got no benefit out of it--the same information is available elsewhere. Also, be careful if you gave them a credit card number to become a member. They automatically renew your membership--but you can always cancel it as an unauthorized charge.

Here is a link to a previous thread on the subject, with about the same comments as appear on this thread. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/000943.html

What a few friends of mine and i did was sign up for one membership. Then we all used the same account to purchase tix since a member can buy tix for any non-member. We all pitched in $20 for the fees. I only used them once for a flight about a year and a half ago to London $405 RT incl taxes. TWA was the carrier and I had to change planes in STL of course. Almost doubled my flight time from Seattle by going through STL though.

Other than that the Bestfares Newsdesk sometimes has good info but the same info usually shows up here too.

-rollyo11