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As a savvy traveler, you first check whether you have a discount certificate you can use, perhaps one given to you as a result of being bumped (refer to the opening story of this chapter) or as compensation for an adverse experience. Doing this before you go online is important for two reasons:

1. Ticketing with a discount certificate can rarely be done online, but will usually require making a reservation directly with the airline, followed by presenting the coupon at the airline’s local or airport ticketing office. Sometimes a discount coupon can be mailed in. While a coupon’s rules will occasionally allow a travel agent to issue the ticket, agents loathe handling such reservations because of very low airline commissions and the complexities that come with applying a coupon.
2. Knowing which airline has provided your certificate will help in your comparison shopping. For example, if you have a $200 United discount certificate and find that the best prices for different carriers are competitive, you know that using your coupon on United is your best bet. Conversely, if Southwest offers a fare that’s $400 less than United’s, you can take the lower fare on Southwest and save your United certificate for another trip. If you own an Entertainment Directory, you may have another discount opportunity. Each directory includes discounts of 5 to 15 percent on some airlines— most recently on United, previously on Continental and Northwest Airlines—by calling direct or (in some instances) booking online and presenting a special discount code.

Unless you have had a close relationship with a travel agent for many years, there is a good chance that you will at least match or often beat a travel agent’s search, for several reasons:
• Travel agents have little incentive to spend considerable amounts of time in search of rock-bottom fares since commissions are low or nonexistent.

• The computer systems used by agents are frequently the same as online agents and airline Web sites.
• In certain circumstances, travel agents do not have access to Web only fares offered by the major travel reservations Web sites.
• An agent will typically charge an additional service fee—most likely at least $25.

In today’s business environment, we need to make more money, but it’s just as important to find legitimate ways to spend it wisely. Nowhere is this more relevant than in travel, since airfares and hotel costs have been volatile over the past five years.
The tragedies of September 11 placed a short-term dampener on airfares. However, indirect costs to travelers have included restructuring of airlines by dramatically reducing capacity and decreasing availability of flights, the laying off of staff with a corresponding drop in customer service and morale, and attempts to tighten security with significant inconveniences. The travel experience has been made more arduous not only by airfares creeping up, but also by increases in penalties associated with nonrefundable tickets, by costly new rules for excess baggage, and by cutbacks in meal service. An emerging variable to factor in to the travel planning process is an inversion of the old paradigm, whereby the typical leisure traveler purchased travel far in advance, while the business traveler sought airline tickets and hotel accommodation at the last minute. Specifically, we are now seeing an increase in the leisure travelers planning trips at the last minute and business travelers purchasing tickets in advance. This adds another layer of complexity to how travel suppliers will price their product.
Similarly, as hotel occupancy rates have edged up toward prior highs, hotel rates have moved in tandem. All of these changes challenge the patience and resilience of world travelers and road warriors alike. that travel has become, confident that you know how to get the best service for your travel dollar.
According to American Express Travel Service’s annual surveys of their business clients, travel and entertainment have been the second-largest controllable business expense after salaries. The Professional Sales Association indicates that entrepreneurs and sales professionals spend an average of fifty-seven nights away from home each year. Even Internet-focused companies acknowledge that truly understanding a client or closing a sale requires face-to-face communication.
So how can we help you survive the challenges of travel post– September 11? Through trial and error—and sometimes paying too much—we have learned how to travel in luxury for (much, much) less. We have invested decades researching, analyzing, and testing all the intricate rules and regulations, all the Web sites, all the books on the topic of travel savings. Obviously, we have spent huge amounts of time and money gathering this valuable information, all in one place, and refining it for ease of understanding. Before today, it has never been presented in one book geared exclusively to sophisticated world travelers and road warriors fed up with paying rising prices for air, hotels, and car rentals—all while being pressured to downgrade.