Keeping a tab on elusive price drops in airfares

Airfare prediction website Farecast.com has launched new tools that help savvy travelers catch elusive price drops.

Published: 15 May 2007

Airfare prediction website Farecast.com has launched new tools that help savvy travelers catch elusive price drops.

Farecast Alerts, powered by Farecast’s proprietary prediction technology, is a new addition to Farecast’s suite of tools that help consumers track their trip and save money.

“No other airfare alert provides a prediction and comprehensive fare history to help consumers catch a price drop,” stated the company. “Farecast also emerged from beta today with unique features for frequent travelers and results of an audit confirming its predictive accuracy of 74.5 percent.”

“We’ve seen a high volume of price drops over the last several months and expect these to continue throughout the summer,” said Hugh Crean, Farecast’s Pesident and Chief Executive Officer. “Airline prices are constantly changing and no other travel site empowers you with tools to capture elusive price drops. Farecast recommends when to wait and provides free alerts that tell you when to buy at lower prices.”

Farecast research reveals that more than 50 percent of price drops disappear within 50 hours, illustrating the need for consumers to stay apprised of fare drops to their chosen destinations. No other travel website tracks available pricing daily to help consumers make an informed choice to wait and buy later, and then provides a free prediction and comprehensive fare history to help them catch a price drop.

“Farecast’s new alerts will be even more valuable for consumers this summer, as a combination of factors, including early indications of weaker demand, increased airline competition and rising fuel prices, promise to make this busy summer season more dynamic and price drops more dramatic. Farecast Alerts are the latest addition to Farecast’s “Track Your Trip” suite of tools which include Fare Guard and RSS feeds. When it predicts fares are dropping or flat, Farecast also offers customers the opportunity to purchase a Fare Guard to protect the lowest fare for their trip for seven days,” stated the company.

Farecast emerged from beta today, expanding its air shopping service to include one-way, multi-city, nearby airports and any class of service. With this release, Farecast introduced innovative new search functionality including a unique Flight Quality Filter that allows frequent travelers to sort by type of flight including red-eye, long layover, short connection or mixed cabin.

Also, in an audit, Navigant Consulting, Inc. confirmed that Farecast’s predictions are 74.5 percent accurate, and that travelers purchasing two tickets could save an average of $55 by using Farecast’s Fare Predictions. Navigant Consulting analysed a random sample of over 44,000 predictions made by Farecast to customers from January 1, 2007 through March 31, 2007, and calculated monthly accuracies of 74.6 percent, 73.6 percent and 75.2 percent, resulting in an overall 74.5 percent accuracy rate for this period.

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