Are school holiday prices a big racket……? Or are holiday prices just based on supply, demand and reality?

It has miffed me for a long time that I work as a travel agent yet I am unable to use a lot of the cheapie deals that you often see, generally at every time of year except school holidays!

This is because my wife is a teacher and therefore we are only really able to travel during school holidays. Now that my son is due to start school in September this situation is about to get even more restrictive so I thought I’d write a piece on it.

I tend to go to New Zealand if Im going anywhere in July and August and its their winter!!

There are two ways of looking at it: the consumers way and the business way and they are polar opposite. As a consumer and an agent I find it outrageous that prices are so much higher over school holiday periods and around, not just that they are high at the last minute (last minute you really have no chance during school holidays I would suggest, certainly for cruises and long haul flights anyway and especially if you a re a family…) but also because airlines, operators and so on have a higher lead in price for these dates as well. They actually start high and get higher and higher until the end and only drop if the demand is lacking.

Personally I think this is a little unfair, as for me I think you should be incentivised for booking early. Surely this is better for operators too, as then they have at least some guaranteed numbers.

Only once they have a base of numbers is it truly fair,  in my opinion to start putting prices through the roof for people who are less organised or committed surely as anyone “looking for bargain” over these dates is in my experience really missing the reality of how airlines and tour operators for longhaul/cruise, certainly work.

In my experience with longhaul flights (which I would usually do at least once every two years) it is better to book as early as possible, there are also exceptions to this depending on where you are going (eg/ flights to my usual destination Christchurch). New Zealand only have a few limited flights that go directly to there so they sell out quickly at any time of year, let alone holidays. If you were looking at say somewhere like Beijing or maybe Delhi for example because the market is flooded with these flights and they aren’t necessarily big holiday type destinations in their own right they do tend to be cheaper than other places, even during holiday periods.

From a business point of view operators/airlines are in it to make money, so they will do what makes them the most. My argument that they should incentivise early bookers doesn’t wash from a large business sense, because “why should they?” lower their price when they know the consumer demand is there and they can fill their planes, regardless of one or two people deciding not to go because of price.

Over the years I have heard quite a few sales analogies in manager speak comparing travel to supermarkets and so on, ie “if you bought a bag of apples for £1 today then saw a bag of apples for 50p the week after, you wouldnt take the bag of apples back and complain would you?”No, I would have probably eaten the apples actually and no you wouldnt. This sort of analogy works for operators as well.

Do supermarkets start at the use by/best before date price for a pack of fillet steak or indeed wait until it gets to that date and sell it lower? No they don’t is the honest answer, they sell at the highest price they can, while they can and usually at a competitive rate for the consumer otherwise they wouldn’t sell anything at all, as otherwise competitors would undercut them. Then and only then if the particular flight or cruise (or fillet steak) is looking a bit “mouldy” would they reduce the price but in reality they wouldn’t, as everyone loves fillet steak, even sell by date fillet steak and supermarkets would never be that wasteful!!!??

Yep me in the freezing cold again!

Which is all very frustrating quite honestly as it means basically tour operators and airlines have the upper hand, so from a business point of view, can I understand why it works that way? Yes I do, its profiteering at its worst but it makes sense.

From a consumer point of view do I like the way it works? No I dont, I want my holiday and flights to be as cheap as possible and generally I wish I didn’t have to travel in holidays but businesses hold the cards and they set the market rate, so its just the way it is!

Nonetheless if I am going anywhere for a length of time in July school summer holidays it will tend to be NZ and New Zealand as per the pictures to the right is freezing cold in July and August, its strange that prices would go up when it is least desirable to go weather wise but hey ho at least I can ski!