10 Ridiculously Outrageous Travel Costs to Avoid ...

Whenever possible, book your trip online; it’s long been the case that the best offers are available on websites but more recently, some airlines have introduced hefty fees just for booking on the telephone. Also, unless it’s a free call number, you’re paying for the cost of the call and the booking process might be lengthy. Make sure you aren’t caught out by these new travel costs.

If you’ve bought an e ticket, make sure that you remember to print your boarding pass before you leave home; some of the airlines have already introduced airport printing fees and the rest of them will be doing so soon.

Whenever possible, avoid checking luggage and never take a second bag or more in weight than the allowance on the ticket. Tips to save money are to check your bags online and whenever possible pack light and manage with whatever will fit into your cabin bag. Toiletries are amongst your heaviest items so one of the best tips to avoid travel costs for luggage is to leave all your lotions and potions at home and buy local once you arrive at your destination.

Nobody minds paying for their flight tickets and everybody assumes that it will include a seat but one of the cheekiest new travel costs that some airlines have introduced is to charge passengers to select the seat of their choice. That means that if you need extra leg room, depending on the airline, you will need to pay for it.

Airlines have long since known that some people want to board flights before everybody else but now they are making those people pay for the privilege of getting to the overhead bins first. Unless you really have a valid reason for getting on the plane before anyone else, this is one travel cost that is easily avoided.

Traditionally pillows and blankets were always provided on flights of any duration, however the airlines have now combined them into sexy little power nap packages. Be warned they will charge you for using them!

Everybody knows that banks will charge us for anything that they can get away with but it can be more difficult to monitor surcharges when we are overseas and already struggling with converting the local currency. These sneaky extra travel costs can add up to 3% on each purchase we make on foreign soil. Make sure that you pay for everything possible before you leave home to avoid this sneaky travel cost.

Nobody can think of a worse scenario that having collision whilst overseas and insurance companies play on these fears and hike the cost of the optional policies when we collect our hire cars at the airport. Before you leave, check with your insurance agent or read the policies you already have to see if you are already covered. Remember some credit card companies offer this type of insurance as well. make sure that you don’t increase your travel costs even more by paying twice for something that you will probably never need.

Airports charge car rental firms to have a desk in the airport and so the car rental firms in turn pass those charges onto the customers who hire cars at those franchises. Whenever possible arrange your rental from another location, but take care that they haven’t inflated their prices to match those charged at the airport.

Many chains of hotels advertise high speed internet access being available in all rooms, but what they are less open about are the high fees that are charged to access the internet in your own room. Be Wi-Fi savvy and use your laptop in common areas or even better if you have smartphone, you can skip the hotel’s connection altogether.

There you have it girls, 10 Ridiculously Outrageous Travel Costs to avoid. The first trick is to actually be able to identify them all, so, as with all financial products – read the small print before clicking the book now button or handing over your credit card to the agent.

Book your trip, enjoy your trip but don’t pay any more than you have to and certainly don’t pay any travel costs that aren’t necessary.

Have you been stung by a travel cost that could have been avoided?

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