How to get the best holiday deals and travel for less
Holiday and travel deals are some of the most searched for terms at the start of the year. In this article we uncover some of the top money saving travel tips, including the best places and best times to look for holiday deals.
Our best booking hacks
Compare & save… price comparison sites provide a great place to begin looking for the best travel deals for flights, hotels, self-catering accommodation and package holidays. Be flexible, if you are able to travel with flexible dates and times you are more likely to find the biggest savings, compared to travelling at peak holiday times i.e. during school holidays.
Use flight comparison sites
Flight comparison sites allow you to compare flights for most routes and airlines. You can make big savings, especially if your departure and return dates are flexible.
There are a number of flight comparison sites, these include:
5 Tips for cheaper flights
- Use a flight comparison website or app to compare deals.
- Be flexible & travel at non peak times, fly outside of school holidays and other holiday periods, when demand is lower and flights are cheaper.
- Allow the airline to automatically allocate your seats if there is an extra charge to choose your own seats.
- Check the package holiday operators who operate their own airlines, sometimes you can find great deals if they have spare seats on flights.
- If you are flying a long haul route with stops consider flying with more than one airline. You can also use a combination to fly one airline on an outbound route and a different airline for your return flight if necessary.
Use accommodation comparison sites
Over the last few years there’s been a massive increase in choice with hotels, b&b’s, rental apartments, villas & home stays available through services like AirBNB, Vrbo and others. Again comparison sites can help you find the best accommodation deals especially if you’re flexible with how and where you stay.
Some of the most popular accommodation comparison sites include:
Search locations and accommodation with Expedia
5 Tips for cheaper accommodation
- Use an accommodation comparison website or app to compare accommodation and prices.
- Be flexible & travel at non peak times, go for last-minute accommodation deals, also consider full board or all-inclusive deals (if you don’t mind eating at your accommodation).
- If you are booking with the accommodation owner or manager ask if they are able to provide any discounts.
- Check package holidays, see if there are any money saving deals with inclusive flights.
- Book through a cashback site to take advantage of cash back offers. Pay for your accommodation using a reward credit card to get additional rewards or points if you have one. If you use a 0% interest credit card, you can also pay off your holiday in smaller chunks over few months.
Get worldwide multi-trip family travel insurance
Paying for single trip travel insurance each time you holiday is likely to be far more expensive than taking out annual worldwide travel insurance, especially if you take a few holidays a year. Group or family travel insurance can be tailored to your needs, providing insurance cover for your whole family in one annual multi-trip travel policy.
Annual family travel cover for accidents, emergency medical care, luggage, flight & holiday cancellations for 18 – 50 age bracket ranges from £100 to £350. For 50 and older age groups travel insurance cover tends to increase in line with risk and pre-existing medical conditions.
5 Tips for cheaper travel insurance
- Buy an annual multi-trip travel insurance policy for you and your partner or family with multi-trip cover. Annual policies tend to cost less than individual travel insurance policies each time you go away.
- If you pay for a premium bank account or credit card check to see if you have travel insurance included. These policies are often adequate for most travel and also provide cover for partners and family.
- Apply for a Global Health Insurance Card (GHIC) for emergency access healthcare & treatment abroad. A GHIC does not negate having travel insurance, you should always make sure you have adequate travel insurance.
- See if you can buy travel insurance through a cashback site. Pay for your travel insurance using a reward credit card to get additional rewards, or points if you have one.
- Always make sure you have sufficient cover not all policies cover all types of holiday e.g. sports activities like skiing / snowboarding are often not covered by a standard policy. Also be aware that certain countries and locations are not covered by some policies (so always make sure you check exclusions and terms and conditions).
Get a travel money card or use a fee free credit card
Check whether any of your bank cards provide ‘fee free’ use abroad. Regular bank cards often add currency conversion fee’s and individual transaction fees when used abroad. These fee’s can really add up throughout your stay and often end up costing hundreds £’s / $’s / €’s .
Make sure you use a fee free card, or better still, sign up for a pre-paid travel money card or bank linked card. Most pre-paid and bank linked foreign currency payment cards often offer fee free use with better FX exchange rates. Fee-free currency card providers include WISE, Wirex & Curve.
Check out our guide here: BEST Travel Money Cards 2025
