The Best (and Worst) Ways to Find Cheap Flights on FareCompare

By: Anne McDermott | 03/16/2010

The good folks over at Hipster Travel have written an article called, “The Highs and Lows of FareCompare.com” but the title is a little misleading.

It might have been more accurate to call the article, “How I Went Wrong: The Sad Tale of a Missed Opportunity” because that’s what it was – a missed opportunity to score a great deal to Europe.

The author had set up an email alert for cheap flights from Detroit to Amsterdam and, sure enough, a great deal came his way courtesy FareCompare – a roundtrip flight for just $575 total. Except, when the recipient of this alert went to look for the deal – it was gone.

What happened? The recipient waited 12 hours.

Great deals simply do not last; they may not last 12 hours and they may not last 12 minutes. The reason for that is, everyone wants a great deal – and there aren’t enough of them to go around. You see, the airlines make only a few seats available at these very cheapest prices, and when they’re gone, they’re gone. You have to be first in line to score.

How to do that? Open your email alert the instant it arrives, and if you like what you see, buy it then and there. Or somebody else will. And that cheap airfare will disappear forever.

Want to get alerts the fastest way possible? Easy. Just sign-up to follow your hometown airport on Twitter (or sign up to follow as many airports as you want). This is how you find out, in real-time, about the FareCompare deals you want – wherever you happen to be.

Take a look at this quick “how-to” video on getting the cheapest flights from your airport via Twitter – and start saving right now.