Continental has launched “Fare Lock,” which charges you a fee to lock in a fare for anywhere from three days to one week. FareLock holds both a reservation and a fare, so you can reserve first and ask questions later.

The price is … vague:

Customers may choose FareLock when booking reservations at continental.com and opt for a 72-hour or a seven-day hold. They may return to complete the transaction at any time between purchasing the lock and its expiration, or they may choose an auto-ticketing feature which tickets at the end of the lock period. FareLock fees, beginning at $5 for a 72-hour hold and $9 for a seven-day hold, will vary based on a number of factors such as the itinerary, number of days to departure and the length of the hold.

So essentially, Continental is selling you a call option on an airfare, with the “call” expiring in either 3 days or 7.

(When Continental starts selling puts, as well as calls, call me… Can you imagine the secondary market?)

This could be useful for some people, if the fare is rock-bottom enough and worth buying insurance for. But remember, if you can figure out your plans within 24 hours, you don’t need such an insurance policy in the first place. After all, Continental still offers a 24-hour flexible booking policy, meaning that you have 24 hours from the time you purchase the ticket to cancel for a full refund, for any reason.

Interestingly, the press release reaffirms the existence of the 24-hour flexible booking policy, so the company is seemingly signaling that the courtesy-cancel isn’t going away. That’s good.

It’s not clear how much demand there really is for such a service. If the price is too high, that demand will disappear really quickly. For now, I’ll most likely rely more on the 24-hour courtesy-cancel, but it’s good to know there’s an insurance option available.

(image)

Airfare forecasting has never been an exact science, but at least economists are trying to make it more precise. From the Observer:

An economist, Makoto Watanabe, has calculated that the optimum time to buy an airline ticket is eight weeks in advance of flying.

His yet-to-be-published findings also suggests that airline tickets are cheaper when purchased in the afternoons, rather than the mornings, prompting him to speculate that airlines are assuming business travellers will book their tickets at work in the morning on the company account, whereas leisure travellers are more likely to book from home in the afternoon.

The eight-week result stems from work published in the latest edition of the Economic Journal in which Watanabe and his colleague, Marc Möller, offer intimidating equations such as ?A = gUG + min(k – g, (1 – g)(1 – r)) as part of the complex formula, where ? equals profit, that determines advance ticket purchases.

The eight-weeks-in-advance rule is plausible, though even then it’s more likely a rule of thumb than a rule as such.

It’s also potentially geographically limited in its validity: If the study was based on flights originating in London, then eight weeks may be the sweet spot for London travelers. But not necessarily for every market.

The buy-later-in-the-day guidance may be more problematic. Recall the myth that buying Wednesday at midnight is the best time to buy airline tickets? This is a variation on that theme.

Finding the cheapest fare is much like picking the precise bottom for a stock. You’re better off trying to buy cheap (I like the email alerts from FareCompare.com for finding fares that are below the norm), not trying to pick the bottom.

(hat tip to Budget Travel)

A few weeks ago, Kayak rolled out a new featured, dubbed “Explore.” (It’s a feature right below “Deals” on the left sidebar.) The site maps fares from a given airport and promises to show you everywhere you can afford to fly.

“Explore” set some business media hearts a-twitter (for example…) upon release, with stories of how innovative this site is, but I’m sorry, it’s not good enough. “Explore” is neither a new idea nor the best possible execution of that idea.

Travelocity had “Dream Maps” years ago, which mapped fares from a given city. You clicked on the fare on the map, and you got a detailed list of the fares, the airlines, the fare codes (!), and the rules/dates applicable. You could click on a fare and a calendar with eligible dates popped up. You could choose dates and search for availability on the spot. I miss this.

One major reason I miss Travelocity’s Dream Maps is because they listed all the publicly available fares that were loaded into Sabre. Sure, you had to click through a number of fares before finding something that met your dates, but they were bookable. That’s not what Kayak is providing. You’re not seeing all possible fares. Instead, Kayak’s “Explore” pulls fares from a much more limited pool. From the site itself (emphasis added):

Fares displayed are for round-trip economy class travel found by Kayak users in the last 48 hours. Fares include all taxes and fees but may not include baggage fees charged by carriers. Seats are limited and may not be available on all flights or days. Fares are subject to change and may not be available on all flights or dates.

A rolling 48 hour window of search results is problematic in a number of ways. Not only are fares rapidly outdated, and thus useless in a search, but by limiting your results only to those cities where someone else has found a fare in the past 48 hours, you’re only getting a small number of actual fares. You’re essentially relying on others doing the searches for you. And those fares are pulled for specific dates, not a range of dates. Not necessarily your dates.

The fact that the range of results — based on other people’s searches in the last two days — is likely to be limited is especially problematic if you’re searching from small airports. New York fares might be pretty reliable, but how about Walla Walla, Washington fares?

Other sites have taken a stab at this, too. FareCompare currently comes closest. But I’ve had trouble actually booking some of the fares that come up. Mobissimo lets you search by regional destinations, too. And again, some of those fares aren’t bookable.

Bottom line: I like the idea of Kayak Explore. It’s a great concept. But someone (else?) can and should make it better. I know it’s a moving target, and a big set of data to sift through, but it was done once. Let’s map the complete range of bookable fares — again — to truly empower the consumer.

Related:
- Flexible-date search alternatives for international destinations
- Reader mail: I don’t care where I go, it just has to be cheap

Downgraded: Inflight booze limits
How much is too much booze to drink on a flight? How about 17 mini bottles of wine between London and Doha? (Thanks, Dr. Vino!)

Upgraded: Deals to Europe
Jared Blank may have posted this on May 27, but if you’ve procrastinated your summer travel plans, you can still (!) book roundtrip flights from Newark to several European cities for only $399 including all taxes, for travel through June 30, 2010. I found seats to Oslo, Berlin, and London, with relative ease. The catch, if you want to call it that: You have to fly via Iceland, with Iceland Express. Be sure to check that volcano ash forecast…

Downgraded: EasyJet’s name
Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the founder of British discount airline EasyJet, has parted ways with the company he built, and is now preparing to sue to have them remove the “easy” prefix in their name. Sir Stelios wants to set up an online travel agency with the same name, which sounds like it’s going to be a delightful time for everyone involved. Haven’t the trademark battles over classic rock band names like Pink Floyd, Yes, and Black Sabbath taught us anything?

Upgraded: Me
Yes, this blog has been out of commission for two weeks, and I apologize for the unannounced absence. After some time fine-tuning the work-work balance, traveling to conferences, and grappling with an unpleasant illness, we’re back on the beat, baby! Thanks to those who wrote expressing concern.

Every year, around this time, there’s a nearly-simultaneous sale on multiple airlines, with discounts for business class airfares across the oceans. It’s as predictable as the Rockettes’ act. (There will be high-kicking.)

Blame seasonality. Beyond the economic slowdown that’s killed premium-cabin traffic, there’s the seasonal slowdown, as business travel grinds to a halt near year-end. What this means for the leisure traveler is premium class deals in premium economy, business class, and first.

Most of the deals are to Europe. Very few deals target Asia. There are a handful of deals to Australia, too, but they’re not the best I’ve seen.

Sure, even the discounted premium seats will still cost you more than a coach seat. But there are some decent prices nonetheless.

Some examples:

Compare a roundtrip in coach from New York to Paris for $858, all-in, on American, with a $1415 fare for the same dates on OpenSkies, the British Airways subsidiary operating an all-premium configuration. (The quoted fare is for a cradle seat, which they call “BizSeat,” vs. their lie-flat “BizBed” product. It’s arguably a high-end premium economy seat, or a low-end business class seat.)

Or Continental’s BusinessFirst sale: Houston to London for $2087 all-in, vs. $1096 for the same flights in coach.

Or check out Lufthansa, which is running specials to a range of European destinations from each of the US cities where it has nonstop departures to Frankfurt or Munich. Cities that don’t see regular fare sales, like Charlotte, get a little love thrown their way, though it’s not quite as generous as the discounts New Yorkers get. (E.g., Charlotte to Amsterdam for $2278 all-in, vs. $1099 for the same flights in coach.)

These flights would cost thousands more at other times of the year.

But not all airlines are playing along. I test-drove Virgin Atlantic Upper Class fares, and I wasn’t impressed at all. Over $3000 for a flight from New York to London? That’s hardly a sale.

Bottom line: If you haven’t booked international travel around the holidays, don’t neglect to search for business class fares. You may find a deal.

As predicted here, Expedia has decided to make its temporary elimination of the airfare booking fee permanent. This follows in the steps of Priceline and Hotwire, which stopped adding a surcharge over a year ago.

The Expedia fee was scheduled to go back into effect on June 1. The company had two choices: Quietly reinstate the fees, and face the marketing wrath of the no-fee competition, or “permanently” kill the fee with a big fanfare. How’s the fanfare sound on your end?

The big agencies still get a cut of the sale, unlike most mom-and-pop travel agencies, so the extra booking fee monies were additional revenue. Many customers (31%, according to here) were doing their searches on the major agencies’ sites, and then going to the airline to book directly and save the fee. Now, the agencies’ fares should be on the same level as the airlines’ own websites.

Interestingly, Expedia also cut change fees in the same breath:

Other fee changes also were announced Wednesday. Expedia.com said it will eliminate the change-and-cancel fees on hotel, car rental and cruise reservations and on most flight reservations. Flights that are part of certain package deals will still be subject to a fee when reservations are changed or canceled. Expedia.com said it will resume charging $20 [on June 1, 2009] to make a flight booking over the phone, a fee that was halted during the promotion.

Eliminating change-and-cancel fees is nice, but it’s just the surcharge, not the totality of relevant fees. Airlines are charging $100, $150, or more to change itineraries for non-refundable booking classes, and Expedia can’t waive those fees. The elimination only applies to the surcharges which Expedia tacked on.

In any case, this puts pressure on Travelocity and Orbitz to make fee cuts permanent as well. Both of those sites’ fee-elimination policies have a sunset clause, and fees are scheduled to re-emerge on June 1. Neither site is commenting on whether they’ll follow Expedia’s lead or not. We’ll see if there are more announcements of newly-permanent fee reductions in the coming days…