5 travel tricks you probably never knew existed

Want free flights, cheap hotel accommodation and best travel insurance deals? Let GoBear teach you some nifty tricks to save on that much-needed holiday!

At the risk of sounding exploitative, minimising your travel spending doesn’t require superhuman levels of resourcefulness. You just need to know the right people. Like the folks working in travel industries, as well as us Bears!

If you are a more visual person, check out our video on GoBearTV.

Making advance bookings is one way, but there are smarter ways to go about securing bewildering discounts without waiting. That is why we ingratiated ourselves to the people in the know, so we can now be in the position to bring you into the know. According to the intel we gathered, finding cheap flights and hotels is just a matter of…

 

Trick 1: Do your research in private browsing mode

There is more to your internet browser’s incognito mode than hiding sites you don’t want other people to know about. When you go on a travel deal hunting spree on the WWW, those travel websites can track your activities via IP address or third party cookies. The next time you return to the site to book flight tickets or accommodation, they would have already recognised where you plan to go and may serve you higher fares for that destination.

The trick to not leaving any digital breadcrumbs is to simply surf as a ghost. Open the options tab and click on ‘new incognito window’ if you don’t want to see prices altered upwards out of sudden.

 

 

Trick 2: Clock those air miles mercilessly on just one air miles credit card

Dedicated travellers, one word of advice: don’t spread your spending over a range of credit cards to chalk up different points. Not only is it hard to keep track, you are not milking travel-based cards hard enough. If you know travel makes up the largest proportion of your lifestyle, stick to just one air miles credit card and mercilessly work it like you are punishing it. Whatever purchase that can be charged to it (even if you’re just buying a loaf of bread at a supermarket), do it.

Depending on which miles credit card you are using, look out for bookings made in foreign currency – something that doubles your air miles earnings for every dollar spent. Some cards like the American Express KrisFlyer doubles your air miles earnings for every dollar spent overseas on eligible purchases. You will be amazed at how quickly you can redeem a free air ticket on Singapore Airlines. That’s one nifty travel trick you’d wanna keep.

 

Trick 3: Check mobile apps for additional discounts and offers

In a bid to encourage users to check out their travel apps, it is not unusual to see big travel and airline websites dangle discounts on already discounted prices. A certain online hotel booking portal has a habit of dangling exclusive mobile-only promotions available only on the app version of their website.

Even better, download all of them and scour through before you make any bookings!

 

 

Trick 4: Fly business class out of Bangkok

We got word from our insider that it is possible to manipulate your booking in such a way that flying business class can come at the cost of a budget counterpart. However, this travel hack has better chances of success for budget destinations such as Bangkok. First, split your flight into two one-ways; for the outbound flight, choose a budget airline. For the connecting flight to your final destination, fly in style by choosing business on a full-service carrier.

How reliable is our insider source, you say? Well, we’ll leave it to you to try it out and verify.

 

 

Trick 5: Shamelessly befriend the people from the travel industry

The operative word here is shamelessly. We hope you don’t hate networking or small talk, because knowing such friends with benefits (not the kind you’re thinking) can get you massive staff discounts, exclusive travel promo codes and news on upcoming deals at the hospitality groups they are working at. Some can also get you slashed prices off travel agent packaged deals, so you don’t have to wait for NATAS to come around.

It is time to get bear-y friendly, people!

 

 

Bonus tip: Insure your holiday!

In this case, we are the insiders. And trust us when we say that comparing top travel insurance plans on GoBear is the best kind of investment you can ever make for your holiday! You don’t want to get caught in a sticky situation if, touch wood, anything goes wrong during your holiday.

 

	Hong Leong Assurance Basic Plan	FWD Premium Plan	American Express Essential
Personal accident	$200,000	$200,000	$125,000
Overseas medical expenses	$150,000	$200,000	$500,000
Special coverage	$3,000 cash relief for death due to accident or sickness.	Unlimited emergency medical evacuation, haze-related postponement or cancellation, wide range of risky sports.	Pregnancy related medical claims, terrorism.
Compliments of the insurer	Free overseas Wi-Fi.	Convenient online claims handling anytime, anywhere.	30% off premiums until 30 April 2017, $30 Robinsons voucher for annual plan.
Premium	from $24	from $19	from $25

 

 

 

This article is kindly contributed by GoBear and is published on ZUU Online.

 

Choosing insurance and financial products was once a complicated and dull process. It was filled with tricks and different terms and conditions. Andre Hesselink didn’t think that was fair. He thought comparing insurance and financial products should be simple, straight forward and transparent. So, with the help of like-minded people, they solved this problem, leading us to GoBear.

(By Gobear)

Related Articles
- How to travel around Japan in 10 days? Here’s your answer!
- 3 more reasons to remember your travel insurance
- Best budget airlines for business travellers