The Site: Â CheapOair.com
- CheapOair.com offers 100 million+ airfares from 400 global airlines
- 85,000 pre-negotiated worldwide hotel rates
- CheapOpick hotel special offers
- The original CheapOpick is now at CheapOstay.com
- Coupon code 4STAR10 – Get $10* OFF all 4-Star hotel bookings
- Flights under $150*
- Business Class airfares with $50 coupon code*
- First Class airfares with $50 coupon code*
- Around the World airline tickets under $2500*
- 4-star hotels under $99*
- All-inclusive hotel deals in partnership with FutureVacations.com
- Car rentals
- CheapOair lowest airfare & hotel rate guarantee
- $5 flight & hotel inconvenience coupon – Covers flight delays that exceed one hour, and baggage delays or lost baggage (per person)
The Good:
CheapOair always has coupon codes for airfare and some good hotel deals. Â Moving on…
The Bad:
The fees. Oh man, the fees. We were very frustrated when testing CheapOair’s airfare prices against the competition, because the first result that comes up does not include the taxes/fees. You are forced to click on the lowest available fare (which takes you to the final booking screen) to see the total price with taxes and fees. After all was said and done, CheapOair rarely came up with the best flight prices during our search. Perhaps CheapOair should revise their search algorithms so that they can come up with better prices. The fact that CheapOair charges such a steep booking fee ($24), really turned us off. Â True, CheapOair always has coupon codes for $10 – $15 off, but this does not even cover their booking fee. Â This doesn’t make CheapOair a scam, because they do clearly disclose the amount of their fees from what we could tell.
We are also not impressed with CheapOair’s “lowest price guarantee”* as it only reimburses you $10 if you find a cheaper flight or hotel elsewhere and this does not even include airline websites (aka. where the cheapest prices are usually had).
Save yourself the headache and try searching (or bidding) on airfare at Priceline.com or Hotwire.com. For international flights, we find that Vayama.com has a nice search engine.
The Fees *:
- $24 Airfare booking fee (per person)
- Up to $25 Hotel booking fee (per room)
- All airline tickets and cruises are fully non-refundable, but “in certain cases where the Airline may allow cancellations, a credit may be available for future ticket purchase and travel on the same airline”.
- $50 airfare cancellation fee (if credit is available)
- $25 hotel cancellation fee (plus the cost of the first night room stay if cancelled less than 4 days prior check-in date). No refund for hotel cancellations made less than 48 hours prior to the check-in date. Fees vary per hotel.
- All cancellations are subject to a $25 booking fee.
*Based solely on research done by TravelSiteCritic.com, these figures may be inaccurate and are subject to change.Verify policies with the website before you book. Please be aware of airfare taxes & fees, applicable to any booking that includes airfare.
Cheapoair does not have it’s customers interest at heart, and that is phrasing it nicely. Just try to contact their “customer service dept”. My last attempt took 30 minutes but I have read that some people have waited an hour and a half! Look at the way Cheapoair offers flight insurance ….there is no price listed and I was told to accept the insurance and prior to confirmation would be told how much it costs. Then I would have the opportunity refuse it. Not at all true …I had to call “Cust.Serv.” to have them change the charge. After reading other customer’s horror stories about them I know that I will have to check on my ticket and seat confirmation with the Airline….fortunately Virgin Air has always treated me well. Fingers crossed.
Saving money is nice but is it worth the aggravation? BEWARE CHEAPOAIR!
I checked with cheapO the night before our flight told everything in order and off to the airport next day. When arrived airline states no such reservation available. Trying to call cheapOair as left on side line at check in 1hour later someone answered at cheapO and tells me we have the wrong res # and gave us right one now 2 hours later we missed our flight. CheapOair gave us the wrong res # and told us sorry but because we missed our flight there was nothing they could do. Left standing in air port no flight had to re book our flight lucky a supervisor from our air line helped us and a 8 hour trip took 30 hours. THANKS CheapOair!! I will never waste my time or money again on them!!!!
Allan, don’t you watch the news, I didn’t have a reservation with Mexicana airlines and I knew they went bankrupt. Shame on you for not confirming details ahead of time, yeah they probably should of notified you.
Let the buyer beware with CheapO Air.
Booked flights to Puerto Vallarta with CheapO Air on Mexicana back in June 2010. Find out the night before flight in February 2011 that Mexicana went belly-up in August 2010. No notification from CheapO. Automated phone service still advising no change in itinerary.
CheapO’s actually travel booked new flights at $500 more for cost. Also have to return from Guadalajara (cost of a night in hotel). No apologies from CheapO. Only directed to Mexicana webstite to try to get money back.
Never again,
Allan
Same experience as Sandra. I kept locking up a phenomenal price with CheapOAir which actually helped me decide to pull the trigger on the getaway. Reserved a hotel right before I moved forward on the airline purchase at CheapOAir. And then WHAM this was a rare occasion that tickets became “un-available” at the very last second. Damn, tough luck… Okay, I’ll choose this one, it’s not THAT much more expensive. WHAM, tickets just became un-available. Argh, well, these tickets are $60 more each, but the time is more convenient.. I guess I’ll just go with these WHAM!, tickets just became un-available! Sorry! Tough break. Now the tickets that are left look closer to like what other sites are selling them for. It looked too good to be true, and that’s Cheap-o-air’s slimy marketing tactic. Never looking at them again.
Cheapoair is a good site.
I really enjoy flight deals to NYC
I just spent more than an hour and half with Cheap O Air server sending me back and forth between screens, having to retype my info only to each time return to tell me the flight they’d offered as no longer available. This was to be my first time booking on cheap o air. Now it will be a “never”
Cheapoair is a total scam. They have hidden fees and even if your flight is cancelled because THEY DIDN’T SECURE THE TICKET, you still have to pay a re-booking fee! Do not use them! You will regret it!