The only people I know who visit high-street travel agents are eightysomethings and skinflints keen to exploit a 'won't-be-beaten-on-price' guarantee after finding a hot online deal. Small wonder; an agent charges a service fee and tries to maximise the cost while tapping the same websites as everyone else - only secretively, in a magisterial manner, from behind a desk.
The question is which 'farefinder' site among the swelling ranks delivers the best price. In the ferociously competitive budget-flight climate stirred up by the likes of AirAsia, there must be some stunning bargains around. To test the market, Technopedia has staged a farefinder shootout.
The target flight: a non-stop, one-way trip from Hong Kong to the capital of cool and freezing fog, London, on January 1, 2009. The websites: Kayak, SideStep, Mobissimo, Farecast, Expedia, Zuji and Hong Kong Priceline. Hotwire does not make the cut since, instead of offering one-way flights, it merely steers the visitor to Expedia.
If I were running an eye-candy contest, with its feel-good orange livery, Mobissimo would clearly beat its rivals. Just as its name trips off the tongue, Mobissimo runs beautifully, all simplicity and elegance. I can imagine the least techy people I know using it happily. If only it were as cheap as it is nifty. The price it comes up with for the flight is US$575.37 (Air New Zealand; depart: 8.15am, arrive: 1.35pm).
Expedia beats that with a quote of US$569 (Air New Zealand; depart: 8.45am, arrive: 2.35pm). Not bad.
Dubbed 'the Google of travel' by the tightwad's bible, Kiplinger, Kayak marginally undercuts that figure with a quote of US$564 (Air New Zealand; depart 8.45am, arrive: 2.35pm). SideStep gives an identical price, airline and time. With Farecast, the airline and times are the same but the price is just a shade lower, at US$559.