Airlines Do Use Dynamic Pricing And User Profiling
For all the airlines like to deny how they use cookies against potential customers, there are some strong indications otherwise.
For instance, in 2018, airline revenue management software provider, PROS, confirmed that many of their clientele now use dynamic pricing.
Dynamic pricing structures do consider user location, customer accounts, previous flight data, shopping trends, and more, to create specialized individual flight prices that differ from customer to customer. PROS clientele includes Lufthansa, Virgin Atlantic, Qantas, Emirates, Southwest, and many more.
Currently, each airline has just 26 fare classes. That’s one for each letter of the alphabet . Airlines can update the prices for each fare class four times per day for domestic flights, and hourly for international flights.
The current flight pricing structure was put into place in 1978, after The Airline Deregulation Act. However, airlines are finding it difficult actually to shift from that system—but that time is now.
Book Your Next Flight With A VPN
Buying tickets for a vacation shouldnt be something that annihilates your wallet. The first step to saving is to get a VPN. Simply change that location to stop websites from collecting your information, and start getting cheaper flight prices! And once you find those cheap flights, a VPN will also help you bypass geo-blocking and stay safe on public Wi-Fi while traveling. Its a win-win situation!
How Big Is The Price Difference
Theres no exact amount that we can guarantee. Online, you can find people saying they managed to save from $20-30 up to a few hundred dollars on a flight by using a VPN.
Our own research showed that with a US IP United Airlines had a one-way flight from Chicago to Paris for around $3,600 in the Economy class. With a Romanian IP, the standard Economy price was the same. However, new deals for the Economy class popped up, which were around $3,150. So, thatd be $450 saved.
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Change Your Location With A VPN
As we mentioned above, hotel sites display prices based on your location. You can change the prices you see by changing your location with a VPN. Our top pick of VPN is CyberGhost due to its large server network.
A VPN, also known as a Virtual Private Network, changes your location by hiding your IP address. Instead, websites will see the IP address of the VPN server you connected to. Additionally, it encrypts your data and secures your internet connection. If you want to find out more about how VPNs work, read our newbies guide.
We wanted to see if The Goring hotel price changes according to location, so we switched our VPN to Paris.
Even though France is not a cheap country, the price of The Goring changed to 495 per night, or about $583.
hats $212 less per night! For the entire week, this price will save you more than $1,400.
Is Using A VPN To Get Cheaper Flights Possible
Whether youre just going on vacation or on a business trip, its extremely easy to spend anywhere between a few thousand dollars up to tens of thousands of dollars per year on airline tickets nowadays depending on how frequent you fly, and where you fly to.
Things might not be this bad if airlines wouldnt rely on online price discrimination so much. Its actually why many frequent travelers have started using VPNs to get cheaper flights too.
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Cyberghost: The Best VPN For Booking Flights
When it comes to using a VPN to find cheap flights, we suggest CyberGhost, for three reasons:
- They have thousands of servers spread across more than 90 countries. This makes it easy to comparison-shop til you drop using virtually any country combinations.
- The monthly cost is exceptionally budget-friendly. Why stop at saving on flights? You can save money each month on a VPN service, too.
- They offer a robust 45-day money back guarantee, one of the most generous in the industry. Take your time finding those cheap flights, then try streaming a whole new Netflix catalog with your VPN. Youll have plenty of time to decide if a VPN is right for you.
Theres Something To This
Years ago, I remember searching on an airline website, and I was amazed at how the price varied when I changed the country setting on the site itself. And although the countries that came up in the experiment above arent necessarily the categorically best and worst countries from which to make these bookings, its probably no coincidence that when I was in Malaysia years ago, all the flight searches I did turned up with horrific prices. .
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Is Buying Things With A VPN Service Legal
Outside of China, Russia, UAE, and some other countries that have banned the use of VPNs, using a VPN is usually completely legal. However, purchasing services or goods with VPNs might be against the terms of service of the company you are buying from. Before you make any purchases, always check the terms of service.
Disclaimer: Surfshark does not encourage using a VPN in ways that would potentially violate the Terms of Service of other service/goods providers.
Will A Free VPN Service Help
If youre looking to get better deals when shopping online, you might also want to save money on a VPN subscription. However, free VPN services may log your data and sell it to the same online shops you want to keep off your trail. Free VPNs may also leave your data exposed with DNS or other leaks. This would allow these online services to still track you.
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How To Use A VPN To Get Cheaper Flights
BEST VPNS WE RECOMMEND
Which Countries Have The Cheapest Flights Which Are Most Expensive
Lower-income countries like Mexico, India, and Italy tend to have cheaper fares although this can be inconsistent and depend largely on the destination of the trip. The biggest price drop I found was when I used ExpressVPNs server in Vietnam to look at flights to and from Vietnam. On the other hand, Vietnam was the most expensive when booking international flights not connected to it.
Flights were almost always cheaper when I connected my VPN to a server in the country that owned the airlines. For example, trips with Lufthansa were significantly cheaper when I connected to a German server since Germany owns Lufthansa.
I also noticed that the UK tends to see significantly lower-priced flights, especially when one of the destinations is within their borders. I tested this by checking prices for a flight between London and Miami. When I compared fares from 5 different servers, the UK had the cheapest rates, even though the airline is American-owned.
I found the cheapest fare when I connected to a UK server
The most expensive flights I found in my tests were from the US and Vietnam . In almost every scenario, I could find tickets much cheaper by connecting my VPN to a country outside of my location, in the US. While Vietnam had super cheap flights to and from its own country, it had the highest fares for trips between other countries .
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How Can A VPN Save Me Money On Flights
A VPN is able to mask your location so you appear somewhere else, meaning you can fight back against this dynamic pricing to make it work for you.
For example, we’ve seen that using server locations like the Netherlands to book flights can save you money. It’s not always huge amounts but if you’re doing it regularly, or for whole families, these savings can add up.
What Is Price Discrimination
If you havent heard of online price discrimination yet, its basically a type of price discrimination which airline companies use to display different ticket prices to recurring or new web visitors, or to users from different countries.
For instance, you might notice that an airplane ticket that was initially $100 doubled in price when you looked it up a second time. Another example would be you living in the US, and finding out you are being charged more for a ticket than someone living in India.
This isnt really a speculation, as changes in price can be noticed even when you change the currency the prices are displayed in.
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How Do I Find The Best Servers For The Lowest Flight Prices
As a general rule, connecting to servers in low-income countries helped me find much cheaper plane tickets. It may sound too-good-to-be-true, but I tested this phenomenon myself to see how much I could save if I was booking from locations with varying economic status. I chose a couple of popular routes and checked their prices for the same departure and arrival dates 4th January and 10th January, respectively . Then I used the currency conversion rate from today to change the displayed currencies into USD for appropriate comparison.
As I currently live in the UK, I connected to a server in London to see what my regular booking price would be on a flight from Miami to Tokyo. My Kayak search results showed that the lowest fare I could pay was about $777. If I didnt know about dynamic flight prices and airline marketing strategies, I would have accepted this fare as my cheapest option. However, I rerouted my traffic through a server in Thailand and found out that the exact same route would cost me $684, meaning an almost $100 price drop.
Unfortunately, using an IP address that was local to the airline didnt always work as Ryanair showed me exactly the same price regardless of which country I connected to. Its definitely a trial and error method that youll need to play around with before you learn which airlines offer the best deals.
Dont Overpay For Your Flight Tickets Get The Best Deals Today
Looking for cheap flight deals takes a lot of time and requires some creativity, but you can secure unbelievably low fares with enough perseverance. All 9 methods can help you save on your next travel, but only a VPN connection can unblock the lowest flight prices possible. Itll also provide an extra layer of protection to keep your passport and payment details fully confidential and away from prying eyes.
Getting a VPN to access cheap deals doesnt have to cost you anything either. By subscribing to ExpressVPN, you can find cheaper airline flights. This will help you book your dream destinations at much more affordable price. Dont hesitate your next big adventure is just a few clicks away!
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Is It Illegal To Use A VPN To Get Cheaper Flights
Using a VPN to get cheaper flights is it ting a VPN to Get Cheaper Flights Legal? As we know, there is no international law that specifically prohibits the use of VPNs for bypassing price discrimination. It would be illegal for an online retailer to discriminate against customers based on their price.
How Does A Website Know My Location
Websites visited by you determine your location using your unique IP address. You location information and data are located within your IP address. This enables travel sites to show you your region specific contents. The IP address enables websites to collect information about the location of the users and what they are doing.
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Plan Your Trips Ahead
Planning your trips ahead is a good tactic to employ even though it has nothing to do with using a VPN.
If youre an avid traveler, you probably know that you can save a good amount of money if you pick an optimal time to book your flight.
For instance, according to farecompare.com, the best time to purchase flight tickets is on Tuesday at 3 pm eastern time.
And for U.S. domestic travel, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays are typically the cheapest days to fly.
What is more, you can also avoid overpaying if you fly during off-peak hours.
What Can You Buy Cheaper With A VPN
A VPN is a great way to save money. Of course, you wont get a discount just for connecting to a VPN in grocery stores or restaurants, but you can save on several things online:
- Flights
- Items with one-time seasonal discounts
- Cinema or other tickets that are subject to age discounts
- Products whose price varies depending on when you visit the website.
In some cases, its as easy as turning your VPN on, in others, you might have to try a little harder. No matter the case, I will gladly explain what you need to do.
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Change Your Ip To A Low
Use a VPN like, for example, SwitchVPN to change your IP address to an IP in a country with lower income.
Then, check how the prices change.
Usually, websites will display reduced prices if your IP address comes from a low-income country.
That’s because airline companies know that people living in a low-income country may not be able to pay the same price for a ticket as, lets say, people living in the UK.
Change Your Ip To Avoid Price Surge
As weve already mentioned, websites often increase prices based on your online behavior.
For instance, when you search for the same flight several times without changing your IP address, you may notice that the ticket costs are gradually growing.
To prevent this from happening, you can connect to any SwitchVPN server you like even if this server is in your home country.
Then, all you need to do is just go back to the website you browsed to see that the prices returned to normal.
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A VPN Ensures Your Privacy Online
Accessing the web via a VPN also keeps your internet activity private. The best VPNs use no log policies and operate from locations outside the reach of the 5 Eyes, 9 Eyes, and 14 Eyes countries. Although searching for flights doesnt seem like a particularly risky task, it might be if your travel involves a destination within a highly restrictive regime.
With censorship at an all-time high in countries like China and Russia, it never hurts to be as discreet as possible when using the internet to search flights to or from those places. Even if youre just going from New York to Miami, shielding your IP address from prying eyes is always a good idea. You never know who might be watching or why.
Takeaway From Changing Ip Location
By performing a change IP location using VPN to get cheaper flights you are now able to go around some online agencies tricks, that are proposing different prices or even content to their online visitors.
Usually, the best prices are offered in countries where there is either a high demand like United Kingdom or Australia, or local salary is lower such as Greece or Czech Republic, therefore having a harder competition and offering lower prices.
After a few tries, you should be able to find for yourself the best countries using VPN to get cheaper prices and use them every time you need to book flights or hotels online.
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Conceal Your Real Ip Address With A VPN
A Virtual Private Network allows you to conceal your real IP address from airline ticket vendors. This, along with clearing your cookies, can ensure you arent served an inflated price.
Your IP address is an indicator of your spending power. In addition, it can be used to track you. This means that your purchasing history may be attached to your IP address. It could pump up the cost of tickets.
Shop Til Your Connection Drops
Prices for a variety of goods arent set at a unified price. For instance, buying a leather jacket from fashion retailer Zara in the U.S. or South Korea would be almost double the selling price than those in Spain. This comes down to taxes and import costs, and the same goes for electronic consumer products.
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How To Buy Cheap Flights
It is much cheaper to fly with airline connections than using direct flights. It is better to check the possible connections manually through options like Multi-Destination Flights, so you can choose your own stops in necessary cities and countries.
It is absolutely not necessary to fly away from the same city where you arrived, it may not affect the ticket price, but you will save on internal transfers back and forth if you plan to see several places.
Subscribe to all newsletters of so-called Pirate websites that provide special offers and sometimes find airline pricing errors: Fly4Free, HolidayPirates, Secret Flying, etc. Youll also then be in the know of when to buy cheap airline tickets.
Save Money On Flights Now
As travel sites continue finding more ways to collect your data, you can easily work around this by anonymously shopping for fights. I found that a VPN is the easiest way to get the cheapest fares from around the world, while never revealing your true location.
Of all the VPNs I tested, my favorite for finding cheap flights is ExpressVPN. It has 3,000 servers in 90 countries, so I could compare prices from around the world. Its also super secure, so travel sites and airlines have no way to track your information. You can try ExpressVPN and all of its money-saving features risk-free, using its 30-day money-back guarantee.
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