Hello fellow parents,
Do airlines offer college student discount? What’s the best way to get low prices? Any suggestion is greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
There are no student discounts that I know of. Usually discounted fares are off full rate and still more than you would get shopping around.
- Research the best airlines for your route.
- Sign up for emails of sales. Southwest runs special that can save if you have the right route.
- Sign up for frequent flyer and consider the airline credit card.
- Book direct but use expedia, etc. to help find fares.
- Fly on Tues, Thurs, or Sat to save.
- Keep checking for deals, although around 35-60 days out will be best. Sometimes price is higher if you are looking too far out.
Thank you!
My D flies to and from school several times a year. We use the hopper app and google flights to start looking for flights about 90 days out. Hopper tells you the best time to book, google sends you a message when airfare goes up or down on your specified flight. Southwest isn’t represented so you have to look them up on their own site but sometimes they have a great deal. Have already started scoping out Thanksgiving flights!
We have had some good deals on Student Universe.
Depends on the route, but Southwest has some advantages. Two checked bags free and no fees if you need to change the ticket.
You really have to comparison shop when using Student Universe. Our kids found their prices to be higher almost every time they checked.
Kiddo rarely used SW since it does not fly to the closer airport to home but otherwise I would recommend them too. It is annoying to throw out a return flight ticket because you need an extra day on campus and the $200 change fee exceeds the $180 replacement flight. No fees to change a ticket is nice.
@buster21, thanks for mentioning the hopper app. I’d not heard of it and will check it out.
My kids all went to college across the country, all to places Southwest does not serve. Agree with all the comments about SWA so, if they fly to/from your locations, definitely sign up for their weekly email and watch for their sales.
Otherwise, I first go to both Kayak and Google flights and see what my options are. Interestingly, they do not always reflect the same options. I agree about the flight alerts–just about all the flight search engines have them. I leave one on all the time for D3’s location which helps me not only find the lower prices but also prompts me to book for the next time a flight is needed when I might not be thinking about it. Good luck.
Last comment–even though I have had the most success over the years using my go-to, kayak.com, I generally then go the airline’s website and, assuming the fare is the same, I book through them. And sign up for frequent flyer programs…one can accrue a lot of miles over 4 years.
Our D must fly to and from her college city due to the great distance. All members of our family are members of airline frequent flyer programs and we have diligently collected frequent flyer miles for our favorite airline from both our flights, hotel stays, car rentals, etc. as well as use of our airline credit cards. I even gave our D currently attending college an airline credit card on my account in her name that she can use in lieu of us sending her lots of spending cash, with the understanding that if she abuses it, I will revoke it.
Our D just started her junior year of college and each of her flights to and from her college city has been on a frequent flyer program award ticket earned from either my or my wife’s frequent flyer mileage accounts. In the event a flight needs to be changed or cancelled, the airline change fees for award tickets are generally far lower than those for the inexpensive, but restricted economy class tickets. If you have elite status with an airline, the change fees can be even lower.
Also, don’t forget to sign up your child for TSA PreChek. It can be a real time saver and is well worth the enrollment fee. Our D has been granted TSA PreChek privileges for every flight since she enrolled prior to her freshman year.
If you live near the Canadian border, get Nexus. It includes global entry, TSA pre-check, lets you use the Nexus car lanes and is cheaper.
Buy airline tickets early, especially for busy travel times like Thanksgiving. Flying two daughters between Minneapolis-St. Paul and the East Coast, we found that tickets to fly home for Thanksgiving were fairly reasonable if purchased months in advance, but prices soar and flights sell out as you get closer to the holiday. Since Thanksgiving falls on entirely predictable days, it’s a no-brainer to buy the tickets early if you want kiddo home for Thanksgiving. And there’s no point in waiting to see if the airline will have a sale on airfares. I’ve never heard of tickets going on sale for peak travel days like Thanksgiving.
We also tend to use the same airline as a family in order to rack up frequent flyer miles. Most airlines will allow you to transfer FF miles to another family member or to use your miles to buy a ticket for a third party (your student). It’s harder to cash in FF miles for free tickets than it once was, and it’s virtually impossible during peak travel days, But some airlines allow you to buy steeply discounted tickets if you cash in some miles. It can be a big savings. (Check the FF rules, though, as not all airlines are alike). We also take our hotel and car rental rewards points in airline miles on our favored carrier. At one time we also used an airline credit card but we eventually concluded that the cash rewards on our bank-issued VISA were more valuable than the FF miles offered by the airline credit card, especially considering the stiff annual fee on our airline’s American Express card. And you can spend cash on anything. Including kiddo’s airfare.
We also pay almost all our household expenses on that one credit card and pay it off in full each month, avoiding interest charges. We really rack up the cash-back rewards points that way. Some colleges will even let you pay tuition and room & board fees by credit card, though our daughters’ colleges charged a fairly stiff fee (2 or 3%, I think) if paying by credit card, so we never did. But I’ve heard some colleges will not charge an extra fee for paying by credit card.