Free! Email First Alerts for New Low Airfare Prices

(Signup / Manage Email Alerts, How They Work)PDF

Quick Reference - Email Alerts on New Low Airline Ticket Prices

Introduction to Free! Airfare Email Alerts

FareCompare.com has added a suite of new alert features and changed the mechanism to signup and mange your alerts based on months of feedback. This document covers the basics of the sign up and management as well as discussing the types of alerts and which are appropriate for you.

Sign Up and Manage Your Free! Airfare Email Alert Profile

You can access the email alert sign up and manage profile page from the FareCompare.com home page or clicking the link at the bottom of any email alert you have received Sign Up Now!.

First Time Users enter your email address and press the signup button. You will immediately take to a display of an empty profile summary which is ready for you to add your alerts. As a convenience your email address can be remembered on future visits to this page.

Existing Users will have their registered email address pre-populated (based on remember option). Alternatively you can enter a new email address. The manage button takes you to the verify security access page where you can either enter one of the departure cities in your profile or send yourself an email with direct link to your profile summary. If you don't have any alerts you will have to send yourself a link to access your empty profile to add, deactivate or unsubscribe.

Free! Airfare Email Alert Challenge Page

Airfare Email Alert Account Profile Summary Page

The profile summary page lists the new low price alerts which have been setup within any of the three following categories:

New User Airfare Email Alert Profile Summary

Example of New User Free! Airfare Email Alert Summary Page

Existing User Airfare Email Alert Profile Summary

Example of Existing User Free! Airfare Email Alert Summary Page

Each alert category displays a list of current alerts (if any). New alerts are added alert by clicking the Add button under one of the alert categories. Remove an existing alert by clicking X icon to the right of the alert. Your work is automatically saved at each step (a Done button is provided to take you back to the home page).

All account profiles are automatically registered to receive our weekly newsletter on new email alert features; Insider Tips and Tricks on how find the best deals and significant travel items of note. All registered accounts will receive this weekly newsletter.

Adding an Airfare Email Alert to your Profile

There are two types of alerts that can be added within an alert category (detail description at the end of this document):

Selecting the Add button below the profile summary for an alert category displays the Add Alert page:

Airfare Email Alert Add Alert Page

You can either add a City Pair Alert by entering in a departure and arrival city and selecting Add to List or a Departure Alert by entering the departure city and selecting the list of cities by group/category name.

Selecting Add to List will take you directly back the profile summary which will be updated to include your newly created airfare email alert.

Suspending or Unsubscribing Airfare Email Alerts

Users who want to take a break from alerts but do not want to lose their profile information may temporarily turn off all alerts by clicking the Deactivate alerts button. At a later time your alerts can be reinstated by clicking the Activate alerts button. A notation to the right the email address shows the current activity status of your profile (Active/Inactive).

You may completely remove yourself from the email alert service by clicking the Unsubscribe button. All your profile information will be completely removed from our system.

Support for Free! Airfare Email Alerts

If you have any issue with our alerts please forward the alert email in question to support@alerts.farecompare.com with a brief explanation of the issue or request.

It is important that you forward us the alert email in question so we can trace what might have occurred.

We will respond promptly to all issues related to aifare email alert service.

How Airfare Email Alerts Work

FareCompare.com is one of the handful of companies worldwide that receives the raw data directly from the airlines. Our unique and sophisticated technology processes this information in minutes and only FareCompare.com distributes the information to consumers IMMEDIATELY.

Others load the information hours after we sent it to consumers. Being first in line allows you the best chance to snap up the limited number of cheap seats on the best deals.

Alerts occur when snapshots of fares are sent to these handfuls of companies. They occur a maximum of 3 times a day for US/CA and 5 times a day for International (weekends have a maximum of 2 snapshots). Many of the cheapest fares are only good for a portion of the day which makes getting and acting quickly on this information vital.

Millions of fares can and do change daily in over 77,000 city pairs in the United States and Canada and over 200,000 city pairs internationally. On any given day numerous new low prices are filed which will trigger a personalized e-mail to you based on your profile.

Departure City Airfare Email Alert

A departure alert is triggered when ANY new low price occurs to a city that can be flown to from the specified departure. This includes two separate lists of over 400 U.S. and Canadian cities along with 800+ International cities.

The sheer volume of price changes each day is very likely to trigger this type of email alert very often because of the number of possible cities touching the departure. A set of filters is provided to further refine the list of cities to track from your departure (for example a Top 50 by airport traffic filter reduces the list).

If you have nearby alternate airport you might want to set up more than one departure alert to make sure you always get notified of the best deals.

If you have a departure alert in your profile and feel like you are getting TOO MANY alerts you may want to only use the City Pair alerts feature which will substantially reduce the number of alerts you receive.

I prefer the departure alerts because it shows me what the airlines are up to. The volume of alerts is high, but a quick glance and email delete is simple and makes sure I don't miss out on a good deal. The airlines do have some patterns you can see even if you are not going to travel to a city where you get an alert. Many times you will get dozens of new low prices in a single alert and this is a good signal that a Fare War might be brewing.

City Pair Airfare Email Alert

A city pair alert is triggered only when a new low price occurs from the specified departure city to the arrival city. This targeted alert is much less likely to trigger an email than a departure alert.

The downside to this type of alert is that you can currently only specify up to ten city pairs. This might seem like quite a few but if you take into account nearby departure airports and destination flexibility you can easily miss out on a really great deal because you did not specify the exact cities where a great deal has happened.

As a rule of thumb, in very competitive city pairs, you might see a couple of alerts a month and in a non competitive city pairs much less. If you do not get an alert right away, rest assured our technology is working tirelessly in the background, scouring tens of millions of fares many times a day and when something happens in your city pairs you will be notified.

Let Us Know What You Think

Any and all feedback is welcome on this service:

support@alerts.farecompare.com

Most of the features of these tools come from feedback from you. We have surprised many with things they just took time to ask for!

Regards,

Rick Seaney
CEO, FareCompare.com