Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Evolution TSE

As half of us will embark on pre-MBA travels, some of us on MBA research tours and the rest on current MBA ventures - CHECK THIS OUT!

Travel search engines(TSE) have become very popular over the years. We all have our individual preferences - Orbitz, Cheaptickets, Expedia, Travelzoo and many others. The benefits are great as it is a pain to individually input the same information into even a handful of different sites. I used to love Travelzoo's Super Search functionality because you could still search individual sites (which tend to be a few dollars cheaper than TSEs) by clicking on the website name. Though the functionality is still there for some destinations, most of the displayed portals are now other TSEs instead of individual airlines.

Today, I found a new TSE, Momondo, though it is European based, you can still use it for cities around the world because you don't actually purchase the tickets through the site. They simply list the websites, prices and alternate flights that may be purchased at the designated price. However, they do not guarantee the price due to the fact that they are simply searching other sites. Momondo was among a handful of new sites to be recognized by CNN. Check that article here.

I'm also testing Yapta to track price changes as I haven't booked my tickets to Europe, Charlottesville or Vegas yet. I'll keep you posted as to what I think!

6 comments:

tinydancer said...

I like Sidestep as well for searching for fares

mbabound said...

i just booked my tickets a few days ago (not cheap) through cheapoair.com (i've used them before). the only place i found anything cheaper was vayama.com but they're new and I didn't want to risk it.

just realized i'm going to be in austria for the eurocup. while i love soccer, this is further going to screw with my budget. argh!

Achilles said...

I like Sidestep for searching for fares within US. they club fares from many sites and you usually get the most cheal fares without spending time on different sites

Anonymous said...

If you don't mind me asking.....did you get a phone call from Darden when you were admitted for Round One.....or did you just get an email?

JulyDream said...

It's typical to get a call from Darden, as it is for most schools, however, I do know, sometimes they don't get to everyone. Personally, I did receive a call, however, I wasn't home to take it, so I simply got a message on my machine. Though that was enough to send me jumping up and down. :D

Anonymous said...

hey, this momondo looks great. i've been using kayak.com, which does the same sort of thing. i'll give momondo a shot and you should give kayak a try.