Airfare: Travel Agent vs. Internet

So beent trying to get my holiday tix back to SF and it's been a bitch on the DE travel sites. They show the great 500EUR deals, then when you click to book they say "Sorry not available" (well then why the F did you show me the selection! ).

The Luft. site isn't much better (here's a great deal, now spend a few hours guessing the date that we have the 1 seat we reserved at this price for!)

Anyway, does anyone know if the Reisburos (sp?) here can typically score the same great deals. Back home they'll nail you for 50-75 bucks, but if they can get me the 500 deal without me wasting a day I'm happy to pay it.

Thanks!

try www.traveloverland.de or .com

they should get you a similar deal

good luck!

I usually phone L'Tur if it's last minute.

Otherwise McFlight (also good for open jaw flights).

My favourite price comparison site which also shows availability is www.billiger-reisen.de

This is good as like here you get a list of all the prices, and can click "Sammelprüfen" to check all the flights with a certain company. It compares them all for you though. So you can see how low the rates go, and then can justtweak the dates until you get what you want.

apparently some things have changed between the travel agencies and airlines, something having to do with an automatic discount the airlines passed onto the travel agencies. as a result, the travel agencies are getting more competitive with each other.
travel overland charges you EUR 8 if you use their telephone info service. bf and i booked our peru flights live w/travel overland and they didn't charge us anything extra.

I have had good experiences with http://www.ebookers.com/

Pretty straight forward, can book online with electronic tickets. Have used it a couple of times going to the US East Coast.

Check Special Flights, and if SF not listed, do flights and you can plug in your destination.

This site worked for me.

Thanks... tried several of those sites and yeah, for some reason the low airfares just don't fly (browser hangs, strange messages, session timeout, etc)... it's like there's a common design to make that impossible so I just say "screw it give me the 650 flight, what's 150?)... anyway, I'll try calling some of the places... like I said I've spent most of today (since testing today has given me long breaks between tests) looking and yet no one wants to take my money!

My husband and I have always gotten better deals through travel agents than the internet. We had a great travel agent in Aachen, haven't found one here yet though so I can't recommend one. We used to search the internet, then tell the travel agent what the best price we found was and ask her if she could beat it. She usually saved us 100 euros or more.

If you travel lots, it is essential to have a good relationship with a good travel agent, methinks.

Does anyone have recommendations for awesome, friendly, helpful travel agents in Munich?

well if u only want to see flights hat are avaioable on a page u hafta select 'nut verfügbare flüge' or sumfin like that. and sites i like are www.skyways.de (i usually look online then call the ppl and they r always really friendly and helpful, www.follow-me.de, statravel.de and this time i used opodo.de and got my flight for 464€ to newark... which isnt a bad price considering that its 3 days before xmas.